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Home / Browse / Eriogonum / Harper's Buckwheat (var. harperi)
iNaturalist — CC, credited & licensed per image
Pictured: Eriogonum longifolium — the species. This variety isn’t separately illustrated.
Polygonaceae family

Harper's Buckwheat (var. harperi) Eriogonum longifolium var. harperi variety

Native Specialist-bee host

Harper's Buckwheat (var. harperi) is a perennial wildflower native to the lower 48 states. A host for pollen-specialist native bees.

More about this plant

Eriogonum longifolium var. harperi, also known as Harper's buckwheat or Harper's umbrella plant, is a dicot of the family Polygonaceae, found in areas of nutrient-poor shale soils in Alabama, Kentucky and Tennessee. It lives inconspicuously in an immature vegetative stage for four or more years before developing a flowering stalk, then flowers and dies. It is listed as an endangered species by the state of Tennessee. It has eleven small populations in Alabama and five in Tennessee but its survival in Kentucky is uncertain. According to a leading expert, Professor James L. Reveal of the University of Maryland, its Kentucky population has been reportedly extirpated. Its 2006 Alabama Natural Heritage Program ranking was G4T2S1, demonstrating an opinion that it was "critically imperiled" in that state. Wikipedia →

Growing & care

USDA PLANTS · TRY
Conditions
Sources · Conditions
Cold hardiness (derived) — Hardiness
Hardiness
≥ zone 7 derived from its U.S. range
Size & form
Sources · Size & form
USDA PLANTS — Lifespan
Lifespan
Perennial
In the garden
Herb layer — Sits in the herb of a layered food forest or polyculture.Open guide →
derived roles
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 ~9 caterpillar species

Eriogonum supports ~9 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 Eriogonum in North America, including:

Anacamptodes fragilaria · geometer (inchworm) moth Aplectoides condita · Quivering Dart Moth Apodemia mormo · Mormon Metalmark Argyrotaenia citrana · leafroller moth Argyrotaenia franciscana · Orange Tortrix Aroga eriogonella · twirler moth
+ 8 more species →
Callophrys affinis · Western Green Hairstreak Callophrys apama · Canyon Green Hairstreak Callophrys comstocki · gossamer-winged butterfly Callophrys dumetorum · Lotus Hairstreak Callophrys lemberti · gossamer-winged butterfly Callophrys sheridanii · Sheridan's Hairstreak Callophrys viridis · gossamer-winged butterfly Chalceria heteronea · gossamer-winged butterfly
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).
✦ Bees specialist-bee host

Specialist native bees depend on it.

Some native bees are pollen specialists (oligolectic) — they raise young only on pollen from particular plant genera. Eriogonum is a recorded specialist-bee host, so losing it can mean losing the bee that relies on it.

Xerces pollinator conservation →
Specialist hosts from Smith et al. 2024.
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.
Sources for this entry (12) 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 — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503) — native status
[06] Description — Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
[07] Ecological value — Warren II 2026 (CC0) · Tallamy host-use counts · Smith et al. 2024 (CC BY)
[08] Conservation rank — NatureServe Explorer (CC BY)
[09] Cold hardiness (derived) — Derived from U.S. range × USDA PHZM zones
[10] Caterpillar host count — Warren II 2026 (Dryad, CC0) · Tallamy host-use counts
[11] Caterpillar species — NHM HOSTS (CC0)
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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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