Golden Ragwort (Packera Aurea)

The Golden Ragwort – an early season treasure for our gardens!

The golden ragwort (Packera aurea) is a perennial native plant of our region that belongs to the sunflower family, Asteraceae. The species is found pretty much across the whole state and is commonly found in eastern North America. Its name comes from the abundant yellow flowers it produces early in the season (all that gold!), at a time when most other spring plants have not flowered. In fact, in our region, the golden ragwort starts flowering as early as March and continues doing so for several weeks/months afterwards.

When is the best time to plant it?

Besides it being a great addition to any space that needs some floral resources, another benefit of this species is its tolerance of a wide variety of growing conditions. Golden ragworts can be grown in conditions ranging from full sun to shade, tolerate heat well, and require some soil moisture. Once established, the plants are great ground covers since they can spread easily thanks to their rhizomes. The ideal time to plant it is in the early spring, so now is a good time to start checking its availability at your local native plant nursery!

After flowering, the rosettes and rhizomes continue to cover and occupy the ground, making them also a great resource to retain water and soil is spaces that may be prone to soil erosion. Related to this, another benefit of this strong ground cover is that because they are so good at establishing, this species can have high potential for competing against invasive plants that we may want to prevent from arriving to or remove from our green spaces.

And if your green space is often visited by deer, this is the plant for you! In fact, because plants cannot escape predation like animals do, they have evolved other ways of protecting themselves against their herbivores. It turns out that all plants produce chemical compounds that act as chemical shields against herbivory. These compounds can make them toxic or unpalatable to many animals, thus leading to at least an unpleasant and at worst a deadly experience if ingested. Well, it turns out that Packera aurea has also some of these defenses! What this means is, first, that it may not be a great idea to try to eat this plant yourself (in case you were thinking of it 😊) and second, that other mammals such as deer will not feed on it due to its toxicity… making them deer resistant!

What do pollinators think of this plant?

Because they flower so early in the season, golden ragworts are very valuable for pollinators. In fact, because there are often not too many floral resources available in the early spring, early-flowering plants such as this one play a key role in supporting early-emerging pollinators.

Packera aurea flowers have been shown to support a large diversity of bees and hoverflies, and of course this diversity increases with the progression of the season. Among some of the species it supports are several sweat bees, little carpenter bees of genus Ceratina and many species of hoverflies. Interestingly, this species has also been described as one of the preferred pollen sources of the rare pollen specialist mining bee Andrena gardineri.