(Mexican Bird-of-Paradise, Mexican Holdback, Mexican Poinciana)

This lovely desert shrub fills many roles in the subtropical, water-conserving garden. It is native to the dry washes and rugged landscape of the northern Mexican hill country. It has an upright habit and open branching, but its foliage is dense. The rich green compound leaves have small oval leaflets are look crisp and pretty. It naturally becomes quite large, but cultivated specimens are typically pruned to remain shorter or single-trunked.

Mexican holdback has deep yellow flowers held in...

(Bodinieri Beautyberry, Profusion Beautyberry)

Profusion Beautyberry is a rangy, deciduous shrub notable for its showy fruits and their placement on the branches. It is a free-fruiting selection of a species native to central and western China. The leaves are tapered, oval and dull-green, with toothed edges. In early summer, hundreds of tiny pink flower clusters appear along the arching stems and attract pollinating insects. By early fall, small, violet berries in clusters of 30-40 in loose clusters have replaced the flowers. The foliage turns...

(Japanese Beautyberry)

True to its name, 'Heavy Berry' produces masses of vibrant violet berries that persist from late summer into early winter. It also features attractive foliage and a relatively compact habit. It is a cultivar of Callicarpa japonica, a small to medium-sized, hardy, deciduous shrub from woodlands of Japan, Taiwan, Korea, and eastern China.

The medium-green, puckered, oval leaves of 'Heavy Berry' are oppositely paired along slender, arching stems. The leaves have serrated edges and tapered...

(Crimson Bottlebrush)

Named and grown for its fuzzy spikes of bright red flowers, crimson bottlebrush is a large, spreading, evergreen shrub or small tree native to eastern Australia. It has stiff, flat, narrow, lance-shaped, green leaves which are coppery colored when young and which emit a lemony aroma when crushed. The flowers appear in heaviest abundance in spring and summer, attracting hummingbirds. The fruits are cup-shaped, small and woody and release hundreds of tiny seeds. The bark is gray to grayish brown in...

Named and grown for its fuzzy spikes of bright red flowers, crimson bottlebrush is a large, spreading, evergreen shrub or small tree native to eastern Australia. It has stiff, flat, narrow, lance-shaped, green leaves which are coppery colored when young and which emit a lemony aroma when crushed. The flowers appear in heaviest abundance in spring and summer, attracting hummingbirds. The fruits are cup-shaped, small and woody and release hundreds of tiny seeds. The bark is gray to grayish brown in...

(Compact Crimson Bottlebrush, Crimson Bottlebrush)

Named and grown for its fuzzy spikes of bright red flowers, crimson bottlebrush is a large, spreading, evergreen shrub or small tree native to eastern Australia. It has stiff, flat, narrow, lance-shaped, green leaves which are coppery colored when young and which emit a lemony aroma when crushed. The flowers appear in heaviest abundance in spring and summer, attracting hummingbirds. The fruits are cup-shaped, small and woody and release hundreds of tiny seeds. The bark is gray to grayish brown in...

(Erect Bottlebrush, Rigid Bottlebrush)

New leaves are light yellow-green and fuzzy but then mature to dark green and stiff on the stiff bottlebrush. It is showiest anytime from very late winter into late summer when branch tips are crimson-red spikes of bristled flowers. This evergreen large shrub is native to east-central Australia in Queensland and New South Wales. Its branches are a ghostly gray-beige with mildly corky dark sandy brown bark.

The dark green leaves are stiff and linear to lance-shaped although when first emerging...

(Weeping Bottlebrush)

Usually grown as a small multi-stemmed tree or large shrub, this narrow-leaved evergreen from eastern Australia has weeping branches that produce fuzzy clusters of bright red flowers in spring and sporadically thereafter. Its light-green leaves are flushed with bronze when new. Several cultivars are available, including the dwarf 'Little John'.

Grow weeping bottlebrush in full sun and well-drained fertile soil. A nice specimen tree for the border or patio, it can also be massed for screening....

(Little John Dwarf Bottlebrush, Weeping Bottlebrush)

Often grown as a small multi-stemmed tree, weeping bottlebrush is a narrow-leaved evergreen native to eastern Australia. Its dwarf cultivar 'Little John' offers the same bright red fuzzy flower clusters but on a dwarf, dense, rounded shrub. The hummingbird-attracting flowers continue through much of the year. The blue-green leaves are flushed with bronze when new.

Grow 'Little John' in full sun and well-drained fertile soil. A nice specimen tree for the border or patio, it can also be used as...

(Michael Lindsey Sweetshrub, Sweetshrub)

Fragrant with scents of fruit and spice, the unusual flowers, and a dense, rounded shape of the Michael Lindsey Carolina allspice make this shrub perhaps the finest selections. A rounded, well-branched deciduous shrub, it is native to the extreme southeastern United States, from Virginia to Florida.

Its leaves are ovals with a gracefully and elegantly pointed tip, and shiny dark green with a lighter gray-green underside. As the leaves begin to emerge in spring, the flowers appear on short stems....