Georgia Wildlife Federation

Resources < Wildlife Habitats < Guide to Native Plants of Georgia for Wildlife < Wild Petunia

Wild Petunia is a handsome, low-growing perennial plant that is easy to naturalize in the hot, humid, sunny environment of the southeastern US. It makes an excellent native groundcover and is sure to delight with huge amounts of large, light violet flowers that stay open only a single day and yet are consistently replaced like the teeth of a shark.

Wild Petunia makes a more than suitable replacement for traditional, non-native bedding plants. It saves money over these plants in two major ways. First, Wild Petunia is perennial, and doesn’t have to be re-planted every year. Second, it is much more drought tolerant, not requiring expensive irrigation. Wild Petunia is just as floriferous, establishes just as quickly, and is hardier and less costly to the wallet and the environment.

FAMILY: Acanthaceae (Acanthus)

DESCRIPTION: Small native flowering perennial. Stems are light green, covered in white hairs, and branch occasionally. Leaves are 2 ½” long by 1” wide, opposite, and broadly lanceolate or ovate. They have smooth margins and are covered in hairs on both sides and as well as the petioles. Violet, to light-blue, trumpet-shaped flowers have five rounded petals and rise on short, hairy stems from the leaf axils. They open in the morning and fall off the plant by evening. The fruits are dark, large, and fall to the ground near the mother plant.

SIZE: 1 to 2 feet tall

HABIT: Compact, low-growing perennial

LIGHT: Full to partial sun

PLANTING AND CARE: Wild Petunia is adaptable to full or partial sun, moist or dry conditions, and any soil type. It requires far less fertilizer and water to look its best compared to non-native annual bedding plants.

ORNAMENTAL VALUE: Assets include the huge amount of flowers produced throughout the growing season and the dense foliage which repels weeds. It is also long-lived, long-blooming, and attracts wildlife.

LANDSCAPE USE: Wild Petunia is wonderful as a native bedding plant in flower gardens, containers, and hanging baskets. It also makes a superb groundcover. It works well as a border or in rock gardens.

HABITAT: Native from Pennsylvania west to Iowa, south to Texas and east to northern Florida. It prefers mesic to dry black soil prairies, gravelly hill prairies, dry open woodlands, limestone glades, bluffs, sandy fields, sand flats, and areas along roadsides and railroads. This plant is typically found in areas with poor soil and sparse vegetative cover, where it occurs sporadically in short grass, rather than forming dense colonies.

WILDLIFE BENEFITS: Wild Petunia is a foliar host to the Buckeye butterfly, which has an array of interesting brown-orange-black-white eye spots. Long-tongued bees are the most important pollinators of the flowers, including Anthophorid bees and Leaf-Cutting bees. The latter sometimes cut the petals, which are used in the construction of brood nests. Short-tongued bees and Syrphid flies also visit the flowers, but they collect stray pollen and are not effective pollinators.

PROPAGATION: Seed is easy, and mature colonies may be divided in spring or fall.