Growing Verbena: Tips at a Glance
Verbena will be a faithful garden companion with purple, pink, or white flowers if you plant this tender perennial in a sunny spot in USDA growing zones 7 to 10. In colder climates, use it in containers (moss verbenas will creep over the edges of a pot) or as an annual bedding plant.
- Type Herbaceous flower
- Lifespan Tender perennial
- USDA Zones 7-10
- Light Sun
- Water 1 inch per week
- Location Well-drained soil
- Design Tip Airy purple backdrop
- Companions Black-eyed Susans
- Colors Purple, pink, white
- Peak Season Summer
Verbena: A Field Guide
Butterflies love verbena (see photo above for proof), and with that kind of recommendation plus 250 species to choose among, why wouldn’t you add this colorful, well-behaved perennial flower to your garden?
Verbenas offer great variety in height (from low-growing ground covers such as Verbena canadensis ‘Homestead Purple’, to bushy Verbena hortensis, to airy, 5-foot-tall purple clusters Verbena bonariensis). Tip: Although V. bonariensis “is frequently recommended for the back of the border, it doesn’t have to reside there because, although it is tall, its form is so delicate that it does not block shorter plants behind it,” writes our contributor Jeanne Rostaing. See more in Gardening 101: Verbena.
Verbenas will be happiest in sunny, well-drained spots and depending on your climate can behave either as perennials (they hail from warm-weather regions in South America) or as annuals.