Myrica gale (Sweet Gale)

Beloved for the sweet scent of its long, glossy leaves, this is a native, bushy, deciduous shrub typically grows 3-6 ft. tall by 3 ft. wide in sun to shade. The waxy fruits are attractive to birds; both fruits and leaves have medicinal uses in indigenous medicine. The flowers are summer-blooming, non-showy, yellow catkins. Sweet Gale is easy to grow on a wide variety of soils -- you'll find it at home in outer-coastal environments in sandy soils near the beach. It may require occasional summer irrigation, even once it's established (depending on your soils and other site conditions), as in the wild it is native to bogs and pond shores west of the Cascades. This plant is salt and wind tolerant, deer resistant, and fixes nitrogen.