How your list is ranked and filtered

What decides the order

Two things, multiplied together:

• How well it suits the spot. Sun counts most, then how wet the ground stays, then how acid the soil is. A poor fit doesn’t vanish, but it sinks.
• How much it does for your goal. Each plant is scored on seven things: feeding caterpillars, feeding bees and butterflies, feeding birds, soaking up rain, holding soil, storing carbon, and surviving on its own.

One rule is absolute: a plant that can’t survive your winter cold is left off the list, whatever its score.

Pick a goal

On the What matters most here? step, or by tapping Goal at the top of your list:

• 🐛 Feed the most wildlife: the usual goal. Caterpillars first, then bees and birds.
• ⚖️ A bit of everything: wildlife, rain and easy care count about the same.
• 🦋 Butterflies & moths: leaves their caterpillars can eat, flowers for the adults.
• 🐦 Birds: berries, seeds, cover, and caterpillars to feed their chicks.
• ⛰️ Stop erosion: deep roots for a slope or bank that washes away.
• 🌧️ Soak up rain: for a wet corner, a downspout or a rain garden.
• 🌵 Easiest to grow: the best odds of surviving with no watering and little fuss.

Under ⚖️ Fine-tune it yourself, seven sliders set how much each thing counts, from “ignore it” to “counts most of all”. Move one and the goal becomes “your own mix”. A preview shows the top three change as you go.

Reading a plant card

• Good match for this spot, Workable here or Poor match, with reasons like “Wants more sun than this spot gets”.
• Its full-grown size and when it flowers.
• Wildlife value, out of 100, and Counts most here: the two things that lifted it highest for your goal.
• Labels such as Essential or No watering. What each label means.

Filters

Tap Filters at the top of your list to keep only plants that pass:

• 🌾 Survives with no watering once it has settled in.
• 🦌 Deer tend to leave it alone.
• 🚫 No thorns or stings: nettles count as stings.
• 🐕 Safe around pets: leaves out anything that can upset a stomach.
• ✋ No aggressive spreaders.
• 📏 Stays under a height, and ↔️ a width, when full-grown.

Filters stay set on this device and apply to every new list, saved spots included, until you untick them. If a list comes up empty, a size limit is the usual cause.

The name box above the list searches all of it, not just the 25 shown. Type “oak” to find an oak ranked 40th.

Filters and labels are the same facts

Filters work on your ranked list only. On the list of every plant, or a region’s plants, you can search by name and browse by kind (trees, shrubs, grasses), but not filter. What you can do there is read the labels on each plant’s page. Each one matches a filter:

• 🌾 No watering → Survives with no watering
• 🦌 Deer-resistant → Deer tend to leave it alone
• 🚫 Thorny or Stings → No thorns or stings
• 🐕 Inedible → Safe around pets
• ✋ Spreads → No aggressive spreaders
• 📏 Full size → Stays under a height or width

Found a plant you like while browsing? Rank these for my spot, at the bottom of a region’s list or the plant list, takes you into the ranked list, where the filters work.