Native Shade Plants in Ohio

Spring blooms are common home beautifiers that you will find in most gardens, courtesy of native plants. In Ohio, most gardens will have at least one tree with a wide shade which hinders the growth of many sun-loving plants – most plants naturally require full sunlight to thrive. All in all, there are several other ground covers that thrive in shades.

Uncovered shaded areas can be beautified too. You can use either one plant or interplant some of the many native perennials to cover the dry shades and enhance your landscape in your Ohio shaded and empty garden spaces. If you are a resident of Ohio and wish to add color to your shaded garden, you can try these shade-loving plants native to Ohio.

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Here are some Native shade plants in Ohio

1. Wild Hydrangea

With hydrangeas, you can give your shady garden a splash of color and make it more beautiful than it would have been without any ground cover. This big leaf plant usually opens up 8 flower heads throughout the season.

Its blooms are pink when the hydrangea grows in alkaline soils but produce blue flowers when grown in acidic soils. If you prefer blue blooms, you can acidify your soil by adding aluminum sulfate.

The first set of flowers appears in spring, while the other sets come in summer and early fall. This perennial is native to the Ohio gardens and should be pruned in early spring to help give it a nice and consistent shape. It is one of the best ground covers you can add to your shaded garden, and it will keep blooming for several more years.

2. Wood Poppy

Famous for its large poppy-like flowers, the wood poppy produces large yellow flowers in March and April. It has leafy stalks and can survive in shades with partial sunlight. Its flowers are produced in clusters which will later produce seeds that Chipmunks enjoy feeding on.

After planting, you can add mulch to ensure the soil around the wood poppy is moist because the flower grows well in humid conditions. The flower later turns into a long seed capsule that will burst and spread its seeds to nearby places.

These seeds will grow in the next season and bloom, increasing the number of wood poppies in your garden. You can choose to eat the flower petals or turn them into tea.

3. Blue Flag Iris

This is a native Ohio perennial with deep green foliage and striking blue-violet flowers that appear in late spring or early months of summer. It naturally grows along the swamp edges, stream banks, and wet meadows. This hardy perennial can grow well in shades and require minimal care.

It grows to about two or three feet tall in soil with adequate moisture. Mulching your garden can help hold moisture for the plants as they grow to bloom and attract bees, hummingbirds, butterflies, and other pollinating birds

4. Turtlehead

The turtlehead grows to about three feet tall and produces either white or blue-pink flowers that appear like a snapdragon. These beautiful blooms usually appear in the last months of summer.

It has many leaves, which are a significant breeding and food source for butterflies. It requires partial sunlight and thus can grow well in shaded areas. They naturally grow in wet areas along river banks and require minimal maintenance.

5. White Wood Aster

The white Wood Aster grows 1 – 3 feet tall and can produce blooms even when grown in dry shades. However, it produces more flowers in partly shaded gardens that receive about three hours of sunlight.

First off, this perennial produces a white delicate, airy cloud of bloom in the late summer. With time, it produces small white flowers with yellow centers, which fade to red flowers on top of the green-black stems. Its blooms attract butterflies that rest on them as they feed and breed.

6. Columbine

Columbines are fast multiplying flowering plants once they get established. Plant one piece of columbine in your shady garden and see it multiply to fill the entire garden within a few months.

It is a spring bloomer that blooms in several colors, and the blooms attract hummingbirds and many other pollinators. It has a dark green thick foliage that turns maroon in fall.

7. Trillium

Trillium grows well in fertile, moist, and well-drained woodland soils. It also thrives in medium to full shades producing white, pink, and red flowers. This Ohio native is related to lilies. It has various stems, with each stem producing a single flower with three leaves holding a three petalled flower.