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Home » Gardening Information » Gardening for Wildlife

Splendid Spigelia—A Beautiful Wildflower That Hummingbirds Love

Plants & Gardens News Volume 17, Number 1 | Spring 2002

by Barry Glick

So you like hummingbirds, huh? Well, have I got a plant for you! Spigelia marilandica is an easy-to-grow but underused native wildflower that's been voted one of the top ten hummingbird plants in the country by Operation RubyThroat, an international research and education initiative based in York, South Carolina.

Apparently the low growing habit and conspicuous blossoms of S. marilandica—whose common names include Indian pink, Maryland pinkroot, and wormgrass—make it an easy plant for hummingbirds to find as they scout the landscape for food. But even if hummingbirds haven't been spotted in your neighborhood since the last ice age and you're simply looking for a sensational addition to the garden this spring, S. marilandica is definitely worth investigating.

A rhizomatous clump-forming perennial, S. marilandica grows between one and two feet high, with about a one-foot spread. It has supple, sometimes glossy dark green foliage that persists throughout the growing season. From late spring to summer, it bears many upright, tubular, bright crimson flowers with light yellow throats. The five-lobed tips of the flowers open gradually and look like small cream-colored stars perched on red pedestals.

S. marilandica is mainly indigenous to the southeastern United States, but its natural range also stretches west to Texas and north to Indiana. In the wild, it is usually found growing in moist soil at the edge of wooded areas or along stream banks. The plant is one of 50 species that compose the genus Spigelia. These species are native to both North and South America, and as with S. marilandica, generally make their home in moist woodlands and thickets. Spigelia belongs to the family Loganiaceae and so counts such genera as Buddleia, Gelsimium, Desfontainea, and Strychnos among its relatives.

During my research on this plant, I stumbled upon the "Queen of Spigelia," the "Maven of Marilandica" ... well, you get my drift: I found an authority. And it turned out to be none other than former Brooklyn Botanic Garden research taxonomist Dr. Kathy Gould, who has studied the genus Spigelia for many years now and has published copious amounts of technical information on it. Kathy informed me that the genus was named after the 16th-century Italian physician Adrian Spiegel (1578Ð1625). "Linnaeus was the one who assigned a name to Spigelia marilandica," she added. "And he made a mistake with the specific epithet, 'marilandica', because the plant doesn't grow in the wilds of Maryland at all."

She also told me that there are five species of Spigelia found in North America altogether. They include S. texana (syn. S. loganoides or Florida pinkroot) and S. gentianoides (gentian pinkroot). Neither is in cultivation right now, but S. texana, a white-flowering species, has potential as a groundcover, and I plan to conduct some trials in my own garden soon. The pale-pink-flowering S. gentianoides is actually on the federal list of endangered species. Probably as a result of agriculture and forestry, the plant is limited to a small number of populations in Florida and Alabama. Conservation efforts are under way at the State Botanical Garden of Georgia, in Athens, Georgia.

Medicinal Roots

S. marilandica has a long history of medicinal use. King's American Dispensatory (1898) tells us that Native Americans harvested and prepared the fibrous yellow roots of the plant as an anthelmintic (a substance that causes the expulsion or destruction of intestinal worms) centuries before the arrival of Europeans.

The plant has also been used to treat endocardial problems and even as a cough remedy. Its active constituent is the alkaloid spigeline. As with many plant chemicals employed in the healing arts, spigeline can be highly toxic, even fatal, if consumed in large doses. Herbal-infusion recipes typically recommend one ounce of pinkroot per pint of water, with a dosage of one tablespoon every two hours.

However, my friend Dr. James Duke, a noted ethno-botanist and author of many books on medicinal herbs, urges caution in experimenting with the plant. "I'm a bit wary of pinkroot, ever since I met a very poisonous related species in Panama," says Jim. "It's such a close cousin to the strychnine clan, the genus Strychnos."

And according to the CRC Handbook of Medicinal Herbs, "If not followed by a saline aperient [laxative], even proper doses may lead to disturbed vision, dizziness, muscular spasms, twitching eyelids, dilated pupils, facial spasms, and increased heart activity."

How to Grow

S. marilandica does well just about anywhere in the garden but is best suited to a fertile, well-drained soil in light shade to partial sun. Situate the plant at the middle or front of any border or in a woodland-garden setting, and I guarantee you it will stop traffic. If you grow it in full sun, be sure to keep the soil evenly moist. It's hardy from USDA Zones 5 to 9.

In the 15 or so years that I've been growing Spigelia marilandica, I'm pleased to report that it has had no pest or disease problems. And though the plant's a magnet for hummingbirds, browsing deer don't seem to have any interest in it.

Propagation from cuttings is frustrating—if not near impossible. The best results I've obtained (a 20 percent success rate) are with 2,500 parts per million potassium salts of indolebutyric acid (Rootone), bottom heat, and mist. But I recommend propagation by division instead. Established plants can be easily divided in early spring while still dormant. S. marilandica enjoys about a four-week "sleep in" between last frost and the emergence of new foliage, giving gardeners a good opportunity to increase their holdings.

I prefer to divide in spring rather than fall, as it gives the plants time to settle back in during the growing season. I use a high-phosphorus fertilizer until the new plants establish good root systems. With autumn division, the plants may not have enough time to anchor down and prevent themselves from getting heaved out of the ground by the freezing and thawing that winter and the following spring inevitably bring.

Seeds of S. marilandica are very easy to germinate. In fact, the plant will self-seed into a nice little colony when left to its own devices. If you want to consciously collect and plant seeds, however, you need to monitor the plant daily in the fall. Although the seeds are not thrown a great distance by the plant, they tend to disperse rather quickly once their capsule ripens to a dark black color. Sow them as soon as they're ripe.

It's perfectly fine to sow the seeds directly into the garden, but I prefer to sow them in four-inch pots on a compacted layer of a standard perennial soil mixÑthis way I don't lose track of the plants, mistake seedlings for weeds, and accidentally pull them up. I add a thin layer of soil, just enough to cover the seeds, and then a thin layer of grit to deter slugs and discourage the growth of mosses and liverworts. (Granite grit is my grit of choice since it's inert and doesn't alter the pH of the soil.) Then I immediately place the pots outside so the seeds will encounter the oscillating seasonal temperatures they need to eventually germinate.

Nursery Sources:

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