Pink Flowers for Central Texas

Lisa's Landscape & Design ♦ 10/08/2024 ♦ Leave a comment

 There are so many beautiful Pink flowers to choose from in the Central Texas landscape. Pink flowers can help create a beautiful, happy color pallet for sun to shade. Texas loving flowers can include an array of pink shades as well as interesting greenery and textures. 

Pink Turks Cap

We will begin with a true blue (or pink) Texas native that is typically found in red. The Pink Turks Cap (Malvaviscus drummondii “Pam Pluryear”) which is a hybrid of the red can be hard to locate, but if you can find one, they are a beautiful addition to the full sun to shade loving garden. Growing 4’ x 4’, it is low water, low maintenance and deer resistant. 
Turks Cap are also edible! Yep, the leaves, flowers and fruit are all edible, making them even more valuable and special in your landscape. 

Pink Dwarf Ruellia

The Dwarf Ruellia (Ruellia Simplex) or Texas Petunia, can be found in purple, white and pink. The pink variation is a happy little mounding plant that spreads by seed over time and provides free plants in the landscape. Thriving from sun to shade, growing to about 8” x 1.5’w. 

Pink Creeping Phlox

The Pink Creeping Phlox (Phlox subulata) is an evergreen ground cover you’ll find covered with bright pink flowers in early spring, then remains as an excellent mat of green all year. Growing to 4-6” t x 1’w, it is a low maintenance, deer resistant plant that loves the sun to part sun landscape. 

Pink Yarrow

Pink Yarrow (Achillea millefolium) is one of my favorite varieties of Yarrow. While the native variety of Common Yarrow can be found in mostly white, the pink is a special surprise when you find them and can be entirely pink or a combo of pink and white as shown below. This medicinal plant known for its healing properties blooms from spring to late fall.

the leaves are delicate and add an unexpected texture in the garden and they grow to about 2’ tall and can spread over time. They thrive from sun to part shade and are deer resistant and drought tolerant.

Pink Salvia Greggi

Commonly used in retail spaces for good reason, this Texas native is a super hearty, sun loving, evergreen shrub. Growing to about 2-3’ x 2-3’ with bright pink flowers from spring to fall. 

Pink salvia does well with an occasional hair cut to keep it from getting leggy and needs to be cut back more severely every few years to produce more greenery and a rounded shape.

Salvia Greggi is a super drought tolerant, deer resistant plants and fairly low maintenance over all.

Pink Skullcap 

One of my favorite border plants is the Pink Skullcap. It is a highly adapted plant for Central Texas that loves the Texas heat and full sun. Growing to 2’ x 2’ with an abundance of rose, pink flowers, it is a beautiful plant along the garden border, planted in mass, or as a single specimen plant. 

‘Peggy Martin’ Climbing Rose

Oh, how I love this rose! She makes me happy in ways I cannot explain. Becoming very popular after hurricane Katrina hit Louisiana and they were left underwater for several weeks, but ultimately surviving. It became painfully obvious that this was a superstar climber that could thrive from drought to flood. 

Quickly growing to 15+’ , it is super disease resistant and pretty much thornless. It loves the sun and provides a profusion of pink blooms in spring and then again in fall. The most important tip for this rose of to give it good support and room to grow. Perfect for hardiness zones 5-11.

 

Pink Daylily

I don’t think most people realize how well Daylilies do in Central Texas. Most will bloom multiple times over the spring and fall, typically slowing down during the extreme summer heat. 

They are super low maintenance and low water and come in an array of colors including shades of pink. 

Rock Rose Pavonia

This Texas native is a non-stop bloomer and it seems like the hotter it gets, the better it performs. As a member of the mallow family, each flower is a two inch hibiscus-type flower, with blue green leaves along long stems of multiple flower clusters.

The Rock Rose Pavonia (Pavonia lasiopetala) opens up in the day and closes at night. It is a butterfly attraction that is just a happy looking plant for hardiness zones 8-13. Another thing I personally like about the plant is that it will reseed and provide volunteers you can use throughout your space, or give to friends and family. 

Rose Meadowsweet, (Subalpine Spiraea)
(Pink Spirea)

This is such a cool plant with its long, narrow leaves and funky pink flower clusters. This deciduous shrub is an interesting addition to the sun to part sun garden, grows to about 2×3’. 

‘Belinda’s Dream’ Shrub Rose

Known as a Texas “Earth Kind” rose, this rose has stood the test of time. Touted as a disease resistant and low maintenance rose, it is a super easy care rose with pink flowers on 5” blooms. It needs a lot of sun and minimal care and thrives in low water and semi annual trims of the dead wood. 

Texas Sage 

Texas Sage (Leucophyllum frutescens) is one of those no brainer shrubs that make a great privacy screen for thier evergreen and color palette. Unfortunately, many people like to shape them, and Tex’s Sage is a free spirit who doesn’t want to be tamed. So, make sure to place it where it can grow to maturity and leave it alone once established.

known as the barometer plant, it is better than the weather report for its ability to predict rain with its flower timing. Growing to 6+feet with silver-green leaves and lovely pink-lavender flowers, this native shrub is an excellent, full sun choice for Central Texas. 

 

Pink Gulf Muhly

Pink Gulf Muhly (Muhlenbergia capillaris) is another favorite, fall blooming plant that makes a big splash in the landscape, growing to about 3’x 3’, it will go dormant in the winter months, then make a return in late spring. 

Ruby Crystal Grass

Melinis nerviglumis “Pink Crystals” is a whimsical ornamental grass with pink blooms that look like crystals in the sunlight. Growing to about 1’ x 2’, it is a perfect little grass for sun to part sun and I find that it really thrives in part sun. A semi evergreen in Hardiness zones 8-10, it is low water and a lot of fun in the landscape. 

Mexican Buckeye

The Texas native Mexican Buckeye (Ungnadia Speciosa) is one of those non-descript trees that may not stop your eye until you see the spring bloom or interesting seed pods that follow. But it is one of my favorite trees for its interesting, small stature (8-10’) and rounded shape. I love the late winter, fragrant flowers and funky seed pods. It is super drought tolerant and  thrives from sun to shade. It is highly deer resistant and polinator friendly. 

Desert Willow

So, I seem to say everything is one of my favorites, but this is an old school love of my life. 🥰 I’ve had a “Bubba” Desert Willow in my yard for the last 3 homes, over the span of 30 years. With its long, narrow leaves and stunning, large, fragrant flowers, it is a must have in my landscape.

Growing to 25’+, it is an open structured tree with large clusters of rose colored flowers. The native variety has very light pink flowers that aren’t quite as exciting to me, so while I don’t like the name “Bubba”, I love the tree. It is s sun loving, super drought to and deer resistant choice for Central Texas. 

 

Mexican Redbud

One of the Texas Native trees that you see a lot in early spring but may not know, is the Mexican and Texas Redbud. The Mexican variety grows to about 20’ and the Texas Variety to about 30’, and both can live in sun to shade. 

Chitalpa Tree

The “Pink Dawn” Chitalpa Tree is a hybrid of the native Citalpa and Desert Willow tree.  With huge flower clusters in a light, dusty pink color, it grows to 30-35’. It is sun loving, drought and deer resistant and a stunning addition to the Central Texas landscape. 

Needles to say, there are a lot of great options. Now that you’ve seen some of the many beautiful choices of pink flowers for Central Texas, I hope I have encouraged to give some of these great native and adapted plants and trees a chance in your landscape collection. 

If you would like some help with more great ideas, designs and placement, contact me for a Landscape Consultation or Landscape Design at Lisalapaso@gmail.com. 

Lisa LaPaso

Lisa’s Landscape & Design

”Saving the Planet One Yard at a Time”