Yellow-flowered Vine Caroline Jessamine

Virtues: The yellow-flowered vine known as Carolina jessamine (Gelsemium sempervirens) is a quick-growing US-native vine that’s easy to grow and offers fragrant blossoms.

Common name: Carolina jessamine, false jasmine, false jessamine

Botanical name:Gelsemium sempervirens

Exposure: Full sun to part shade

Season: Late winter to early spring, for flowers

Flowers: Clusters of one- to two-inch-long, trumpet-shape, buttery yellow flowers appear in late winter to early spring.

Foliage: Leaves are lance shape and medium green. This evergreen foliage takes on a bronze or purplish tone in the fall and winter.

Habit: This yellow-flowered vine has woody, twining stems that can reach 20 to 30 feet long as a climbing vine or a bushy, three-foot-tall groundcover.

Origins: Woods and thickets of the southern Mid-Atlantic states through the Southeast and into eastern Texas. It is South Carolina’s State Flower.

How to grow Carolina jessamine: Plant this vine in full sun or partial shade, in any kind of soil with good drainage. The more sun, the more flowers. Keep it watered until its roots are established, but then it can withstand some drought. USDA Zones 7–10.

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