One of the most beautiful wildflowers in the entire Great Plains region, in my opinion, is leadplant.

Amorpha canescens has been described as “a rather ordinary looking small shrub with an attractive bloom, but otherwise with no particularly outstanding features.” (Missouri Botanical Garden)

I agree that it’s not the most graceful plant when it’s young, but with age it develops into an attractive small bush.

It behaves like an herbaceous perennial that dies back to the ground most years, but as it matures it becomes more like a small shrub with stems that are woody at the base.

Pruning it back to a foot high in early spring helps maintain a tidy appearance and encourages fresh new growth and abundant flowers.

By late spring, the silvery leaves and flower buds catch the eye, giving the plant its “lead” gray color.

By July, the bush is topped with slender spike-like clusters of bluish-purple flowers, each dusted with gold anthers. The flowers only last about three weeks, but the slender seed pods, which remain on the tips of branches, add interest well into the fall season.

It grows in a wide range of soil conditions, but avoid planting it in wet clays and in very dry, sandy soils.

Leadplant takes several years to reach maturity, but it is well worth the wait.

Grow leadplant in sunny well-drained soil in a rock garden, butterfly garden, or plant it with short prairie grasses to form a prairie meadow and to help hide its bare ankles from view.

One of my favorite prairie-style plant combinations is leadplant with pasque flower, prairie smoke, prairie dropseed, butterfly milkweed and shell-leaf penstemon.

Not only is it rugged and beautiful, it also has a fascinating history and makes a great conversation piece.

The common name refers to the belief that the plant indicated a presence of lead in the soil.

The leaves were dried and used for tea by American Indian tribes and prairie pioneers. Leadplant makes a wonderful, orange-colored prairie tea that rivals any traditional tea, whether hot or iced.

The Omaha-Ponca called it “buffalo bellow plant,” because when it was in flower it meant the buffalo would soon be coming into rut, bulls bellowing on the prairie.

Those sturdy pioneers that plowed and broke the virgin prairie called it “devil’s shoestrings” in reference to the extensive, stout roots that snapped like a thick leather shoestring when they were cut by the plow.

Leadplant was named the 1999 Perennial of the Year by the GreatPlants® for the Great Plains program. For more information about the program and a compete listing of recommended plants, visit the website.