Florida Wildflowers
Red and Orange

Grassleaf Barbara's Buttons - Marshallia graminifolia

Family - Asteraceae

Florida native, perennial herb/forb. In late spring/summer this plant produces erect flower stems 1.5 to 2 feet tall topped with a single, composite, pink to lavender colored flower 1 to 3 inches in diameter.

Barbara's buttons has a basil rosette of petiolate oblanceolate leaves, stem leaves are cauline and linear in form. Barbra's buttons likes the moist to occasionally flooded acidic sandy or organic soils of bogs, wet praries, and mesic woodlands in locations with full sun or very little shade.

Catesby's Lily - Lilium catesbaei

Family - Liliaceae

Also called pine lily, this native perennal herb produces a single, large red and orange flower 5-6 inches across with 6 reflexed tepals, the tepals are yellow at the bases with purple spots. The Pine lily grows in wet to moist flatwoods, bogs, savannahs, and wet prairies in locations with full sun to partial shade.

The plant itself is unremarkable when not in bloom, a simple basal rosette of narrow, liner to lance shaped leaves 2 feet long, the flower is the largest among Florida lilies, sometimes bending its long slender stem to the ground.

Salt Marsh Mallow - Kosteletzkya virginica

Family - Malvaceae

Habitat - Fresh and salt marshes, low lying moist woodlands primarily in coastal areas.

Description - Native perennial, may grow as a herbaceous plant or as a small shrub 5 to 6 feet tall. Leaves are cordate to lanceolate with toothed margins, stems and leaves are hairy.

Flower - Pink hibiscus type flower, just under 3 inches across with 5 petals surrounding a tube consisting of the fused stamens and style.

Orange Milkwort - Polygala lutea

Family - Polygalaceae

Habitat - Moist sandy soils in pinelands, wet prairie. Numerous tiny orange flowers in dense clusters, 3/4 inch diameter and 1 to 2 inches long.

Description - Biennial, Forb/herb. 6 to 12 inches high.

Dwarf Sundew - Drosera brevifolia

Family - Droseraceae

Habitat - Small carnivorous plant found in wetlands, generally in moist sandy soils at margins of marshes, swamps, wet prairies and pineland depressions.

Description - Native perennial, forb/herb. Carnivorous plant, 3-4 inches tall.

Flower - White to pink, rising above plant on stalks.

Pink Sundew - Drosera capillaris

Family - Droseraceae

Habitat - Wetlands, moist sandy soils at margins of marshes, swamps, wet prairies and pineland depressions

Description - Native perennial, forb/herb. Carnivorous plant, Leaf hairs produce a sticky liquid from glands to trap small insects which the plant digests to supplement the nutrient poor soils in which it grows.

Flower - White to pink, rising on stalks up to 1 foot in height.

Largeflower Jointweed - Polygonella robusta

Family - Polygonaceae

Habitat - Scrub, Scrubby Flatwoods, moderately moist to dry, well drained sandy soils, endemic to Florida.

Description - Perennial sub-shrub, Forb, herb, 3 to 4 feet in height. Generally taller than broad, stem leaf elliptic, basal leaf ovate-lanceolate.

Flower - 17 to 30 white to pale pink tubular disk flowers on a branched inflorescence.

Pink Woodsorrel - Oxalis debilis

Family - Oxalidaceae

 

Not native to Florida, originally imported as a decorative garden plant. Perennial herb, 6-12 inches tall, spreads by rhizomes and bulbs and can form large colonies.

Paintedleaf, Fire-on-the-mountain - Poinsettia cyathophora

Family - Euphorbiaceae

Habitat - Hammocks, Pinelands.

Description - Native annual or perennial herb to 30 inches tall. Hollow stems and the leaves exude white milky sap when broken or torn.

Powderpuff, Herbaceous Mimosa - Mimosa strigillosa

Family - Fabaceae

 

Habitat - Dry to moist open areas in sandy soils, statewide.

Description - Native. Perennial, Sub-shrub, Forb, herb. Forms dense mats. 2-10 inches high, flowers with stalk to about 3 inches. Leaves are pinnately compound, sensitive to touch, folding closed when touched.

Flower - Rose-mauve, pink, 1 inch in diameter on 2-3 inch long stalk.