Nativar is a new term coined by Dr. Allan Armitage, Professor Emeritus from the University of Georgia. It combines the words “native” and “cultivar”. Nativar refers to a cultivar of a native plant. It attempts to excite the horticultural marketplace about new cultivars of native perennial plants, such as blackeyed Susan (Rudbeckia spp.), purple coneflower (Echinacea purpurea), coreopsis (Coreopsis spp.), and many others.

Nativars are native plants that resulted from natural or man-made cross pollination. Many natives have undergone a so-called “facelift”, one that enhances the plant’s appeal or improves past deficiencies such as better flowers or disease resistance. The “new and improved” versions drive new sales of natives to professional landscapers and gardeners. This excites their pop and sizzle at the garden center.

A native tree may not develop good fall color. When an individual plant is spotted in a nursery row or in a forest, the nativar is born, tested, named, and propagated. Plant scientists at the University of Tennessee found anthracnose resistant flowering dogwood (Cornus florida) in a Maryland forest. It was tested, propagated, and named ‘Appalachian Spring’. Since its introduction sales of native dogwoods have increased.

A single nativar may be derived from a large seedling population which possesses wide genetic variability for its ecological surroundings. The nativar may not excel over thousands of acres. For example, a nativar exhibiting deep red fall color may not express this color trait a thousand miles away.

Provenance, where the plant originates, plays an important role. Red maples (Acer rubrum) grow in a wide geographical area in the U.S. and Canada. A cold hardy red maple from Wisconsin will likely not survive a hot humid Georgia summer; a Georgian red maple may not cope with a hard Wisconsin winter. An Oregon red maple nativar with flashy red fall color may fizzle in the southeastern U.S.

Native aster species (Symphyotrichum spp.) grow over a wide geographic area of the eastern U.S. Not all aster nativars planted on a single site will flourish.