Lantana

When it's heating up in our summer landscapes, lantana are hard to beat. These plants love the full sun, have good color, and thrive in our hot and humid summer conditions. Most gardeners know that lantana not only produce big color, but can also be big plants, like this group of Grand Ma's Pumpkin Patch lantana. At three feet tall, this lantana has a presence in the landscape. Grand Ma's Pumpkin Patch produces an almost unbelievable number of flower clusters. The flower clusters start out with yellow centers, and transition into a bright and vibrant pumpkin orange. When massed together, the flowering of this lantana resembles a carnival of harvest colors. But there are some smaller selections. New Gold lantana was a Mississippi Medallion winner in 1996 and is still an outstanding plant. It's vigorous and low growing with a dense, trailing habit. New Gold has showy clusters of golden yellow beginning in late spring all the way through to fall frosts. Another low growing lantana that has done well in my landscape for the last four years is Butter Cream lantana. Butter Cream has flower clusters that start out buttery yellow and fade out to white. Both New Gold and Butter Cream typically grow less than two feet high with a three foot spread. And like all lantana the butterflies and hummingbirds just love them. So go ahead and plant some of these beautiful lantana for big impact in your landscape. I'm horticulturist Gary Bachman for Southern Gardening.