Privet Senna
Cheerful yellow flowers and a host plant for our sulphur butterflies, the little yellow ones dancing across every native yard.
Senna ligustrina
The yellow-flowered sulphur butterfly nursery.
Why it works here
Note: a legume, so it can handle poor sand but does better with a little organic matter
Plant this if you want cloudless sulphur, sleepy orange, and orange-barred sulphur butterflies, because it's a larval host, meaning the caterpillars eat it and grow up on it. It carries showy yellow flowers mostly through our dry season, fall into spring, when a lot of the yard is quiet. It's a fast, cheerful filler for a sunny native or pollinator bed, and bees work the blooms too.
Care
Give it full sun and it's easy. Water while it establishes, then back off, since it's fine on the dry side and hates wet feet. A little compost improves the sandy ground but it'll grow in lean soil on its own as a legume. Expect caterpillars to chew the leaves, and leave them be, that's the whole point of the plant. A light prune keeps it bushy.
Common problems
The honest caveat: it's a filler and a buffer, not a backbone shrub. It grows really fast, gives you a good 5 or 6 years, and won't outlive the big long-haul natives, but it reseeds, so new plants come along as older ones fade. The chewed, ragged look from caterpillars bothers some folks, though it means it's doing its job. It can also reseed around, which is easy to pull.
Common questions
Something is eating all the leaves, what do I do?
Nothing. Those are sulphur butterfly caterpillars, and feeding them is the reason to plant it. The shrub bounces back, and you get butterflies.
How long will it last?
A good 5 or 6 years, usually. It grows fast and works as a filler or buffer among longer-lived shrubs, and it reseeds, so the next generation is usually already coming up when an older plant fades.
Will it take over?
It can drop seedlings nearby, but they pull out easily, so it's not aggressive, just generous.
Interested in a privet senna in your landscape?
We plan, install, and care for it. Start with a paid consultation.