Wild Cotton

Wild cotton is a rare plant; it needs protection against missuses and protection against removal from natural populations.



Use as a short-lived "shrub". Dies back with freezing but will re-sprout from the roots. Use as a specimen plant.

Not salt tolerant of inundation by salty or brackish water.



Some tolerance to salty wind but not direct salt spray.

It is not legal to plant this plant, but the reasons are very dated.

A Florida law was passed in the early 1900s banning the growing of wild cottons, which can attract boll weevils.  The intent was to protect commercial cotton farming.  Methods of agricultural protection are more advanced today, and the native Florida cotton does not grow in the parts of the state where cottons are grown commercially.  However, the law is still on the books.

Dry sites. Tropical hammock, coastal berm, shell mound. Disturbed area.

• Showy flowers, Showy fruits
• Larval host plant for gray hairstreak (Strymon melinus) butterflies.
• Flowers attract bees, flies, thrips, grass hoppers, and beetles, and ants (Kale 2014).