New Jersey Tea is a low-growing, compact native shrub with dark green foliage and creamy white, fragrant flower clusters in late spring and summer. The flowers provide nectar and pollen rewards to the Ruby-throated Hummingbirds, butterflies, and other numerous pollinators they attract. This plant requires well-drained, average to dry soil with an acidic pH. It is an actinorhizal shrub that can thrive in poor, unfertile soils because it fixes its own atmospheric nitrogen with the aid of specific soil bacteria in the genus Frankia. It is quite drought-tolerant once established because it possesses a stout, woody taproot that can go down deep for the moisture it needs. Unfortunately, this is a very palatable plant to rabbits and deer, so protection during the establishment phase is highly recommended.
Sources:
Native Trees, Shrubs, & Vines by William Cullina
Manual of Woody Landscape Plants by Michael A. Dirr
Midwestern Native Shrubs and Trees by Charlotte Adelman & Bernard L. Schwartz
Eastern/Central Medicinal Plants and Herbs by Steven Foster and James A. Duke
Missouri Botanical Garden
Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center
Illinois Wildflowers
