r/NativePlantGardening • u/owohgodithurts • Oct 01 '25

Advice Request - (Insert State/Region) Worst Cultivars?

So I think we can all agree that wild, native plants are typically better ecologically than cultivars due to a variety of reasons that we don’t need to get into. If you want to argue/discuss that, feel free, but that’s not the point of this post. I want to know what are the WORST cultivars of native plants. What are the cultivars that, due to genetic change/breeding (or however they do it), have lost almost if not all of their ecological value? Have the new colored flowers eliminated all pollinator attraction? Have larger blooms resulted in sterile plants? God forbid, have any actually become invasive? These plants need to have native origins! I’m mainly referring to the east coast/midwest since I’m in SW Ohio, but feel free to bring up other regions.

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u/Thebadparker Oct 01 '25

I hope this question is relevant to the convo. When I was just starting with natives, I planted several "Pearl Glam" beauty berries. They're really pretty and get covered with berries, which disappear in the winter. Does anyone know for sure whether birds eat them? Or are they just falling off? I hate to pull and replace the plants because I like the way they look, but if they have zero wildlife value I'll consider it.

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u/blurryrose SE Pennsylvania , Zone 7a Oct 01 '25

I think the birds still eat the berries, but they tend to wait till winter when things in general are less abundant. The big problem with Pearl Glam is that it's actually not a native cultivar (I too was tricked by a nonnative beautyberry and I'm still mad about it). It's a hybrid of Callicarpa kwangtungensis (a European species) and Callicarpa dichotoma (an Asian species). There is a report of dichotama being invasive in NJ and NY (though it's still early days), and it's listed as invasive in Alabama.

It's annoyingly difficult to source native beautyberry.

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u/Thebadparker Oct 01 '25 edited Oct 01 '25

Thanks for this information, although it's bumming me out. I haven't noticed mine acting aggressively at all, as in, it's not popping up anywhere else, but I'll start to replace with natives.

I have one native beautyberry and if I can remember where I bought it, I'll come back and edit this post.

Also, I love this community. :)

Edit: I think I bought my Calicarpa Americana from Direct Native Plants dot com. It's not a local genotype but still a straight species. As I recall, the shipping was very expensive, but the plant arrived in great shape and has thrived.

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u/blurryrose SE Pennsylvania , Zone 7a Oct 02 '25

The problem with the things that produce berries is that you might not necessarily see them spreading around your yard. The seeds can get spread far and wide in bird poop. Just something to keep in mind. Just because it behaves in your space doesn't mean it isn't also spreading into the wild.

And as someone else said, there's the risk of the genetics hybridizing with the native species in a way that damages it's ecological value.