Ironweed – New York (3.25″ pot)

Description

New York Ironweed – Vernonia novaboracensis  – hardy native wildflower with saturated magenta-violet puffy flowers. Plants get tall – up top 7 feet. Great for wet areas although it is fine in drier spots as well. Blooms are late in summer and continues into fall, providing food for insects at a time of year when food sources are scarcer. Full or partial sun.

New York Ironweed is a lovely species, not as aggressive as Common Ironweed, as it only spreads by seed. If you trim the flower heads before the seeds mature, you won’t have an issue with this plant spreading too invasively.

The other main distinguishing characteristic of this species is that the flower heads get thread like tips on the bracts beneath the flowers giving the blooms an elegant and

Foliage is bitter and repels mammals from browsing, but plants in the Vernonia genus are host plants for a variety of moth and butterfly larvae and other insects, including: American Lady butterfly (Vanessa virginiensis), Parthenice Tiger Moth (Grammia parthenice), Ironweed Borer Moth (Papaipema cerussata and Papaipema limpida), Eupatorium Borer Moth (Carmenta bassiformis), Red Groundling moth (Perigea xanthioides), Pyralid Moths (Polygrammodes flavidalis and Polygrammodes langdonalis), Ironweed Plume Moth (Hellinsia paleaceus), Ironweed Curculio Weevil (he larvae of this weevil feed on the pith of ironweeds), Midges (including Asphondylia vernoniae and Youngomyia podophyllae) which form galls on the plant’s buds and flower heads. Many of the larval species bore into / eat the roots and stems, perhaps helping to balance the aggressive nature of Common Ironweed’s rhizomes.