Here in Gainesville Fall is upon us. It almost seemed that on August first the weather started to lighten up a bit. It’s funny how a brutal summer will make 90 degree highs seem tolerable. With the Fall season comes change….. a new school year, nicer weather, and colorful plants in the Florida landscape.
Yes, I said “Fall, color, Florida, and landscape.” all in the same sentence. It is true that in most of Florida the only tree you may see change color for Fall is the Red Maple while in northern states entire plant communities light up mountainsides with a spectacular array of colors. You will have to look a little harder in Florida but the colors are here!
May I present Beautyberry to you. This woody shrub, to me, is a great indicator of Autumn’s arrival. Right now I can spot a Beautyberry at 60 miles an hour due to the glow of the berries. They have such a brilliant color to them that they just pop out of the landscape.
The scientific name for Beautyberry is Callicarpa americana. The genus Callicarpa is actually a compound word from the Greek words for “beautiful” and “fruit” For once the people who give plants common names got it right! I could just see them calling this Beautyweed or Uglyberry the way they name some other plants….
Beautyberry flowers are white to pinkish in color and are usually present late spring to fall depending on where you live. The leaves are so large and the plant so bushy at times that you may not even see the flowers.
The berries like the flowers are borne on the stem of the shrub. The berries start green and ripen to a brilliant purple. As they ripen the berries increase in weight. When all the berries are ripe the branches of this multi-stemmed shrub bend downward revealing giant clusters of berries.
The berries persist on the plant well into winter and are a good food source for many different animals. Beautyberry is deciduous which basically means it drops its leaves and goes dormant. If you have a Beautyberry in your yard you can cut back the bare stems very hard so you won’t have a scraggily bunch of stems sticking out of your garden and it will come back from roots in the Spring.
Beautyberry can be grown in shade or full sun and can tolerate many different soil environments making it a great addition to you Florida friendly landscape
