August 2026

Most of the plants we feature earn their spot with flowers. American beautyberry earns it with fruit. Right now, along woodland edges and fence lines across Central Alabama, this native shrub is producing tight clusters of berries in a purple so saturated it looks artificial the first time you see it. The blooms in early summer are small and easy to miss. The berries are the whole point, and they arrive in late August and hold through September and October, right when most of the landscape is winding down.

August is when the damage from a Birmingham summer becomes hard to ignore. Areas that were full and green in May are thin. Bare spots have opened up along walkways and in the middle of the yard. The lawn generally looks tired and a good rain hasn’t fixed.

Every spring, homeowners across Birmingham look at a lawn full of annual bluegrass, henbit, and chickweed and wonder where it came from. The answer is that it germinated the previous fall, while the lawn was heading into dormancy and nobody was paying attention.

If you manage a commercial property, a school campus, a municipal facility, or an HOA community in the Birmingham area, there’s a good chance your budget is finalized in October. That means the real decisions about grounds maintenance happen in August and September, well before contracts are signed and the budget is set.