Natives by ZIP

Native plants recorded in your state and county

Native plants · Iowa

Native plants of Lee County

34 plant species are recorded as native to Iowa in Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants and USDA PLANTS, and recorded in Lee County by USDA PLANTS. 8 of them have growing records you can filter by light, moisture, height and estimated cold hardiness.

County summary · USDA PLANTS and Kew WCVP

Lee County, Iowa

PLANTS records only 8 garden-ready natives here (under 30). County records are thin in some places; the Iowa list is a useful second check.

Native species
34 Typical Iowa county: 44 (median of 99 counties)
Garden-ready natives
8 Typical Iowa county: 24
Share by type (all 34 native species)
Percent of the 34 native species in each growth type
Tree 9% (3)
Shrub 3% (1)
Wildflower (forb) 35% (12)
Grass or grass-like 35% (12)
Fern 18% (6)

Wildflowers make up the largest share of the native list (35%), followed by grasses and grass-like plants (35%).

Recorded native ranges can include long-established populations that spread from gardens; check your state’s native plant society list for local guidance. How native status is decided.

ZIP codes mainly in this county fall in USDA hardiness zone 6a (2023 map).

The native plant list

Cold hardiness is estimated from each plant’s PLANTS minimum temperature. How we estimate it.

Garden-ready natives 8

Native species with PLANTS growing records (height, light, moisture, minimum temperature). “—” means PLANTS has no value.

Garden-ready native plants of Lee County, Iowa
PlantType HeightLight Water useHardy to
blackjack oak Quercus marilandica Tree 25 ft Sun Low Zone 6a
boxelder Acer negundo Tree 60 ft Shade-tolerant Medium Zone 2b
common hackberry Celtis occidentalis Tree 60 ft Shade-tolerant Low Zone 2b
field horsetail Equisetum arvense Fern 11 in Sun–part shade High Zone 3a
nodding beggartick Bidens cernua Wildflower (forb) 3.2 ft Sun–part shade High Zone 12a
northern maidenhair Adiantum pedatum Fern 1.3 ft Shade-tolerant Medium Zone 3b
roughfruit amaranth Amaranthus tuberculatus Wildflower (forb) 6.6 ft Sun High Zone 4a
smooth horsetail Equisetum laevigatum Fern 5 ft Sun Low Zone 3b

Other native species recorded here 26

PLANTS has no growing records for these, so light, moisture, height and zone filters cannot include them. Many are wild species seldom sold by nurseries.

  • bluejacket Tradescantia ohiensis
  • bluntlobe cliff fern Woodsia obtusa
  • Canada lettuce Lactuca canadensis
  • Christmas fern Polystichum acrostichoides
  • churchmouse threeawn Aristida dichotoma
  • clasping milkweed Asclepias amplexicaulis
  • early wildrye Elymus macgregorii
  • ebony spleenwort Asplenium platyneuron
  • fall witchgrass Digitaria cognata
  • hairy woodland brome Bromus pubescens
  • northern dewberry Rubus flagellaris
  • poverty oatgrass Danthonia spicata
  • prairie groundsel Packera plattensis
  • prairie ironweed Vernonia fasciculata
  • prairie threeawn Aristida oligantha
  • purple milkweed Asclepias purpurascens
  • sandhill amaranth Amaranthus arenicola
  • sixweeks fescue Vulpia octoflora
  • slender crabgrass Digitaria filiformis
  • slimspike threeawn Aristida longespica
  • southeastern wildrye Elymus glabriflorus
  • Spanish needles Bidens bipinnata
  • threeflower melicgrass Melica nitens
  • tumble windmill grass Chloris verticillata
  • western silver aster Symphyotrichum sericeum
  • yellow pimpernel Taenidia integerrima

Compared with Iowa

The typical county is the median of the 99 Iowa counties with PLANTS county records; the statewide figure counts every species native anywhere in the state. More species is not better or worse: counties differ in size, habitat and how thoroughly they have been surveyed.

Native species counts, Lee County and Iowa
MeasureLee CountyTypical countyStatewide
Native species 34 44 1,374
Garden-ready natives 8 24 496
Tree 3 — 110
Shrub 1 — 72
Wildflower (forb) 12 — 779
Grass or grass-like 12 — 298
Vine 0 — 55
Fern 6 — 60

Neighboring counties

Counties that share a ZIP code with Lee County.

Look up another ZIP

Matches your ZIP to the county it mostly lies in, then lists the plants recorded as native to your state (Kew’s World Checklist and USDA PLANTS) and recorded in that county by USDA PLANTS.

Source & data date

Source
USDA NRCS PLANTS Database: county distribution records, native status and plant characteristics. CC0 (public domain dedication, per the data.gov catalog record).
Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP): native or introduced status by state. CC BY 3.0.
USGS US-RIIS (ver. 2.0): species listed as introduced are excluded. CC0.
Citation
USDA, NRCS. 2026. The PLANTS Database (https://plants.usda.gov, 11/04/2026). National Plant Data Team, Greensboro, NC USA.
Govaerts R. (ed.) (2026). WCVP: World Checklist of Vascular Plants. Facilitated by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. Data file dated 2026-06-04, http://sftp.kew.org/pub/data-repositories/WCVP/ (retrieved 2026-11-04). Paper: Govaerts R. et al. (2021) The World Checklist of Vascular Plants, a continuously updated resource for exploring global plant diversity. Scientific Data 8, 215.
Data date
Retrieved from PLANTS on November 4, 2026; WCVP data file dated June 4, 2026.
Zones
USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map (2023) ZIP table: PRISM Group, Oregon State University, https://prism.oregonstate.edu, accessed November 3, 2026. Plant zones on this site are our estimate, not the official map.
Scope
Lee County (county FIPS 19111), Iowa. 34 native species from PLANTS county distribution records; garden-ready = species with a PLANTS characteristics record.
Method
A species is listed when it is recorded as native to the state in Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants and USDA PLANTS, and recorded in the county by USDA PLANTS. Species PLANTS labels both native and introduced are listed separately. Full method · All sources

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