a true Cinderella

This one is on everyone’s short list of favorite native shrubs, although at this time of the year it’s hard to see why.

Euonymus americanus is in bloom now, but the flowers are small—pale, greenish to light rose—and easy to overlook. During a season filled with beauty queens this spindly native bush is a true Cinderella. Often thin and lanky, even awkward, it tends to hide in the shadow of others.

Most of the year, the plant is nondescript. Its hour of flamboyance is reserved for the fall when the evergreen’s bright magenta seedpods ripen and split to reveal large orange seeds. When completely mature, the seeds pop out and are tossed up to 15 from the parent plant. This colorful, almost gaudy, fruit and dramatic seed dispersal leads to the shrub's most common folk name: hearts a bustin’.