© Melburnian · CC BY 3.0
Wikimedia Commons — CC, credited & licensed per image
Chenopodiaceae family
Swamp Saltbush Atriplex amnicola
Early-season nectar — Flowers in a late-winter / early-spring window when few other plants in our catalog bloom — valuable early forage for pollinators (relative to our catalog's bloom coverage).
Swamp Saltbush is an introduced perennial shrub, found in the lower 48 states. It blooms Jan – Nov.
More about this plant
Atriplex amnicola, commonly known as river saltbush or swamp saltbush, is a species of shrub in the family Amaranthaceae. Endemic to Western Australia, it is native to the floodplains of the Murchison and Gascoyne Rivers. Wikipedia →
Growing & care
USDA PLANTS · TRY Conditions
Sources · Conditions
Cold hardiness (derived) — Hardiness
- Hardiness
- ≥ zone 11 derived from its U.S. range
Size & form
Sources · Size & form
USDA PLANTS — Lifespan
TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0) — Foliage
- Lifespan
- Perennial
- Foliage
- Broadleaf
In the garden
Shrub layer — Sits in the shrub of a layered food forest or polyculture.Open guide →
derived roles The garden year bloom → fruit → fall colour
J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
D
Bloom
Bloom (the flower's colour)
Bloom · Jan – Nov — 44 obs · Herbarium specimens — Park et al. 2023 (CC BY 4.0)
Species characteristics from USDA PLANTS (public domain) + TRY (CC BY) — general guidance, not a
guarantee for your exact site. Deer "browsing" is documented palatability, not a deer-proof claim.
Wildlife & pollinators
How pollinator value is scored →❧ Caterpillar hosts ~5 caterpillar species
Atriplex supports ~5 caterpillar species.
Native butterfly & moth caterpillars are the base of the terrestrial food web — most songbirds rear their young almost entirely on them. As a host for native Lepidoptera this is a modest genus.
Recorded feeding on Atriplex in North America, including:
+ 8 more species → ↑ show fewer
Keystone count (genus-level) from Warren II 2026 (CC0) · Tallamy host-use records. Named species (a documented Nearctic sample, not exhaustive) from NHM HOSTS (CC0).
Species thumbnails re-hosted from iNaturalist — Creative Commons, credited per image (hover for credit). Click any species to see it on iNaturalist. Not exhaustive; many taxa have no openly-licensed photo yet.
Related plants
More Atriplex → Native
Alaska Orache
Atriplex alaskensis
●○○○○ Native
Atriplex muricata
Atriplex muricata
●○○○○ Native
Ball Saltbush
Atriplex fruticulosa
●○○○○ Native
Basin Saltbush
Atriplex tridentata
●○○○○ 
Native
Beach Saltbush
Atriplex leucophylla
●○○○○ 
Native
Big Saltbush
Atriplex lentiformis
●○○○○ Same genus / family, ranked by ecological value — from the PlantKey catalog
Sources for this entry (16) Open & cited
[01] Scientific name & family — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[02] Growth habit & duration — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[03] Native status & distribution — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)
[04] Common name — USDA PLANTS (via GBIF)
[05] Invasive / introduced status — US-RIIS v2.0 (USGS)
[06] Wetland indicator — USACE National Wetland Plant List (2022)
[07] Photos — Wikimedia Commons — CC, credited per image
[08] Description — Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
[09] Ecological value — Warren II 2026 (CC0) · Tallamy host-use counts
[10] Bloom period — Herbarium specimens — Park et al. 2023 (CC BY 4.0)
[11] Foliage — TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0)
[12] Functional traits — TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0)
[13] Cold hardiness (derived) — Derived from U.S. range × USDA PHZM zones
[14] Caterpillar host count — Warren II 2026 (Dryad, CC0) · Tallamy host-use counts
[15] Caterpillar species — NHM HOSTS (CC0)
[16] County range — GBIF Open Data — open-licensed occurrences (CC0/CC-BY) → county
Spot an error or have a better photo? Every field links to its source, and the whole dataset is open.
Cite this page Open data, please attribute
PlantKey’s data is open under CC BY-SA 4.0 — free to reuse and adapt, with attribution and the same licence. Photos keep their own per-image licence + credit (see Sources above).
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