Native Plants for Shade

Shade is not one condition. Dry shade under a mature Norway maple is a far harder site than the moist, open shade on the north side of a house, and a plant that thrives in one may fail in the other. Check the moisture line on each plant's page alongside its light requirement. Many of the species below are woodland plants adapted to the Northeast's deciduous forests, where they take advantage of the light that reaches the ground before the canopy closes in spring. Several are spring ephemerals that go dormant by midsummer — a normal cycle, not a failure — so pair them with ferns or sedges that hold their foliage and fill the gap they leave.