Northern Neck Native Plant Co

09/03/2026

Back at our Tappahannock Takeover we pulled weeds and added more diverse plantings to help bolster bare spots.

New additions include: Bush Clover, Little Blue Stem, Foxglove Beardtongue, Moss Phlox, and Spartina patens.

We also increased the Eastern Joe Pye in the Sweetbay Magnolia Tri-Oval and added Wild Strawberry. Front planters had more Blue Mist Flower added to wet areas.

A Red Chokeberry was added to the shrub hedge.

09/02/2026

TL:DR - tides are higher than we thought. The tidal grasses we planted are thriving and we will be adding more!

Decided to venture back to the end of Virginia St in Urbanna at high tide to see what our ecosystem looks like.

Well, this would explain why most of our plants didn’t make it!

We dropped another 42 spartina Alterniflora plugs to help fill in the area and are excited to have a better sense of this area as a low marsh!

09/02/2026

How We Are Helping Growers This Fall

We’re very fortunate to have budget set aside this fall to purchase plants from growers (or retailers) who are sitting on excess inventory.

How it works: if you’re a plant store or grower and you undersold or over planted a native, straight species crop, we want to hear from you! We’d like to purchase your inventory to give away or pot up in our inventory.

Why this is important: growers and sellers are low-margin enterprises. Sometimes they run out of room to up-pot unsold inventory or they simply have to compost it. In either case, it strains their business. There’s also lots of folks who need/want plants but maybe can’t afford them. This is our market oriented solution to the problem.

How you can help: buying our plants helps us provide this service! You can also donate (not tax deductible) to this effort if you’d like to.

08/31/2026

One of the more interesting (and new to us) native plants we discovered on the backdune of our VCAP installation: Trailing Fuzzybean aka Annual Sand Bean.

The vines had plenty of seed pods so we hope to collect and grow this vine for next year!

Strophostyles helvola, commonly called amberique-bean,[2] annual sand bean,[3] or trailing fuzzybean[4] is a species of flowering plant in the legume family. It is native to eastern Canada and the eastern United States.[1]

08/31/2026

With just 16 days left to pre-order plants, we thought we’d start sharing examples of some things available for pre-order (and some that will only be at the Stafford Plant Sale!).

Today’s Spotlight: Ebony Spleenwort

Native to nearly every county in Virginia, this shade to part shade lover is for dry to medium moist soils that are well drained/rocky with a preference for acidic sites.

$10/true quart with 15% going to the Central Rappahannock Chapter of the VNPS. Price includes sales tax and delivery!

08/30/2026

VCAP Project Check-In + Lunch with the New Hire

This project was a great example of how cutting back and removing some natives - in this case the Groundsel Bush and Marsh Elder - allowed for wider array of native plants (both planted and in the seed bank) to flourish.

Additionally, the most overlooked (in my opinion) drainage and flood solution is simple shredded wood chips and mulch. By clearing this area of over abundant natives that were shading out grasses and flowers and adding 3” of wood chips, grasses, and seeds, to a low lying area, this flood prone mucky waste has turned into a pollinator haven. Pictures can’t do justice to the immense bee, butterfly, moth, and insect activity.

The biggest surprise was the explosion of Salt Marsh Aster which we didn’t even plant!

08/30/2026

It’s a beautiful day to visit the certified wildlife habitat we planted in Urbanna and we were not disappointed!

The Spartina alterniflora has grown gang busters while the spartina patens and switchgrass round out the high marsh.

WE EVEN GOT SNAILS.

08/28/2026

One of our tougher jobs: Sandy eroding slope in the hot sun. We cut back tree limbs and planted plugs this spring right before a drought so success was uncertain.

Native plants PREVAILED