North Carolina › Onagraceae › Oenothera
Common Evening-primrose
Native. The Oenothera genus feeds 20 caterpillar species in NC, draws 23 bee species in the Southeast, including 4 pollen-specialist bee species that depend on it,; 5 bird species have recorded feeding interactions with this genus in North America. Strong for caterpillars, bees, specialist bees and birds. Includes +1 provisional points for additional documented insect groups.
Insect resources, birds and habitat
Bars show recorded counts on a linear scale. Each category runs from zero to its largest count in this NC plant catalog; the same scale applies across plant pages. Compare plants within a category, not bar lengths across categories. Zero records may mean missing research. Growth form is shown as text.
Additional insect evidence
Bar length follows recorded-name count on the displayed scale, not ecological importance. Unknown is not zero support. Flower visits do not confirm feeding or pollination. Named insects may include historical or unresolved names.
Provisional additional insect credit: +1 (maximum 5). Scoring rule and limitations. Study references and interaction records are included in this plant’s data record.
Fit for your county
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Overwintering: no reviewed hardiness guidance loaded. Heat tolerance is not assessed.
| NC status (state rank) | S5 |
| Grows in | usually drier ground (wetland occurrence proxy: FACU; not a measured watering requirement) |
| Soil pH range | 5.0–7.0 |
| Light | part sun to full sun (USDA PLANTS shade class 'High', read inverted (coarse)) |
| Recorded in NC | Coastal Plain, Mountains, Piedmont; recorded in 70 counties (USDA) |
| Single-host caterpillars on genus | 7 |
| How the number was set | Base score 80, no adjustment (common in NC). Scoring uses relative ranks; display bars show counts. Caterpillar, bee and bird data are by genus. |
- Vascular Plants of North Carolina, plant list export 2026-09-01 (LeGrand, Sorrie & Howard)
- Robertson 1929, Illinois flower visitors; GloBI contributor transcription (visits, not confirmed pollination)
- Shropshire & Tallamy 2025, Lepidoptera of North America north of Mexico, ZooKeys 1261 (ODbL)
- Noori, Seltmann & Orr 2026, A curated and integrated dataset for exploring global bee-plant interactions (GloBI), Zenodo, CC BY 4.0
- Smith, Bachelder, Russell, Morales, Mosher & Seltmann 2024, Bee-Specialization-Modeling v0.6.1 (specialist host table compiled from J. Fowler's pollen specialist bee lists), Zenodo, CC BY 4.0
- Hurlbert, Olsen, Sawyer & Winner 2021, Avian Diet Database, Scientific Data 8: 260 (CC0)
- USDA NRCS PLANTS Database, growth habit (public domain)
- Narango, Tallamy & Shropshire 2020, Few keystone plant genera support the majority of Lepidoptera species, Nature Communications
- U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, National Wetland Plant List 2022, Eastern Mountains & Piedmont
- USDA NRCS PLANTS Database
Machine-readable: oenothera-biennis.json. Cite as: Quercus Score v0.6.4, Oenothera biennis, North Carolina, 2026-09-24.
Quercus Score v0.6.4 · built 2026-09-24 · North Carolina beta · sources and limitations on every page