Vitex is in bloom across North Texas. Here’s what to know about the blue-flowering plant

And there she was. As my wife and I rounded the corner heading toward our son’s house in McKinney to pick up two of our grandsons this past Sunday afternoon, this radiant beauty called out my name. I’d been wondering what topic to use for this column, but my worries were over. I wanted to sing her praises in glorious voice.

Vitex is in bloom all across North Texas right now — and to slur the words of that old Neil Diamond song, it’s a “Beautiful Noise.” We don’t have many blue-flowering shrubs or small trees, so when one comes along, we certainly want to work it into our plantings.

Before we go any farther, let’s establish a few do’s and don’ts with this plant. Some of these are simply untrue. Others are downright grating on the plant’s outstanding qualities.

The scientific name is Vitex agnus-castus. I don’t know a lot of species names that use hyphens. It sounds like some kind of late Friday evening compromise between a committee of botanists just before their biennial conference shut down for Memorial Day. Whatever, that’s been its name for as long as I’ve been in horticulture. (Now approaching my bicentennial year.)

The plant’s common name needs to be “vitex.” Five letters. Not much question about how you’d pronounce them. Forget this silly “Texas lilac” stuff. It’s not at all related to lilacs. It doesn’t look the least bit like a lilac. And, even in the dark, it doesn’t smell like lilacs.

If you’re not happy calling it “vitex,” I’ll give you the other accepted common names. Work on these. “Chaste tree.” Or “monk’s pepper.” I’m not going to explain how it got those names. I just Googled them, and they’re depressing. Not good selling points I’ve decided. So, it’s “vitex” for me.

This really isn’t a tree. It’s a large shrub. But then again, so are crape myrtles. Yet we train crape myrtles to grow into tree forms. But at least they have straight trunks. Vitex trees’ trunks are gnarly and nasty. Honestly, though, that can make for an interesting look in your landscape. Sometimes “gnarly” and “nasty” blend right in.

People think this is some shiny new plant that just hit the market in the past 20 years. I grew up mowing around these things as a teenager down in College Station. They were huge because yards back then were huge-r. Folks had room to let them grow to full height (15 to 20 feet tall) and width (20 to 22 feet wide). English professor Dr. Hayes and his wife next door had a giant one in their back yard, and I remember the clouds of butterflies circling around it late every spring.

That was the ‘50s. By the ‘60s and ‘70s lots were getting smaller and people weren’t growing vitex plants like they used to. Then, by the ‘80s folks had begun to rediscover some of our best old-fashioned shrubs, perennials, and reseeding annuals. And there were vitex plants waiting at the gate.

Over the past 40 years growers have introduced several new types. “Montrose” and “Shoal Creek” are selections of improved flower form and color, as is LeCompte from noted Texas plant breeder and friend Greg Grant. Compact and pink and white forms have also been in the marketplace for decades.

Going back a little farther, I decided to look the species up in Liberty Hyde Bailey’s historically outstanding Standard Cyclopedia of Horticulture. I’ve accumulated three sets of these voluminous works. My dad, himself a PhD botanist and college professor at Sul Ross, then at Texas A&M, knew Dr. Bailey. I looked in my dad’s desk copy of the three-volume set from 1935 (compared to the six-volume set from the 19teens), and in its paragraph on Vitex agnus-castus the book says that it’s “hardy as far north as New York in sheltered positions.” He described their attractive flowers and continued with his description, “They grow in almost any kind of soil and prefer rather dry, sunny situations.”

And that’s about all Bailey had to say. He then switched from “Vitex” to “Vitis” (grapes), about which he wrote 13 full pages. Vitex was the gnat’s eyebrow back then. I guess compared to fresh and wine grapes, it still is.

Want to plant a vitex? Buy it the moment you see it in full bloom in a nursery near you. Plant it immediately into a location where it will receive full sunlight and ample space (15 feet in all directions from any other shrub or tree and 15 feet from any building, fence or wall).

Decide how you’re going to train your vitex, either shrub-form or as a small, multi-trunked tree. It’s generally best to let them become established before you start doing any major shaping and pruning. By then you’ll be able to see the directions in which the plant is taking itself.

You can remove unwanted branches at any time of the year but remember that you can never put them back. Have someone hold a branch down and out of the way before you commit to pruning it away. That’s especially critical if you’re removing a larger, older branch. That pruning might be best saved for mid-winter when you’ll be best able to see the branch angles clearly without the interference of the leaves.

Vitex plants bloom for a couple of weeks in early summer each year. Gardeners along the Texas Gulf Coast often prune their plants heavily after the spring bloom. That encourages them to put out a second flush of vigorous new growth and, therefore, another round of blooms in early fall. We rarely would get that kind repeat bloom here in the Fort Worth/Dallas Metroplex because of our early first freezes.

But that late spring bloom we’re seeing now still makes them worth growing.