Rudbeckia hirta

With their yellow petals and dark centers, black-eyed Susans can create a striking cheetah-spot pattern in the garden, especially when massed. The plant lives for just two years, but can persist through self-seeding as long as perennial species don’t overtake its space. Black-eyed Susan forms a low rosette of foliage in its first year and flowers in its second. 

An inhabitant of fields, roadsides, and meadows, black-eyed Susan prefers full sun and moderate moisture, but tolerates light shade and drier conditions. The plant can handle drought and works well in parts of the home landscape that can get hot and dry, such as tree lawns. It’s a nice option for places where short plants are required, and its early bloom (June) is also an asset. When planted with Ohio spiderwort, foxglove beardtongue, and narrow-leaved sundrops, it brings color to the garden during the late spring / early summer interval. 

Pollinators generally do not flock to black-eyed Susan, but the plant is still appreciated by a number of species of bees and flies. Long-horned bees, for one, may be seen circling the flowerhead’s cone-shaped central disk, gathering pollen from one disk flower after another.

References: 1,2,3,4.

Photo by Ashley Keesling.