A popular Texas garden favorite, the Vitex likes to put on a show every summer. In late summer, it’s beautiful violet colored flowers clustered in tall spikes appear, attracting many colorful butterflies and hummingbirds. Nicknamed the Texas Lilac, the Vitex grows quickly and is easily maintained due in part to its drought tolerance. The Vitex is typically grown as a small tree or shrub that reaches around 10 – 15 feet tall and 15 feet wide. These trees bloom every year in their season with minimal effort on the gardener’s part for about a month.
Chaste trees produce showy 5-to-7-inch spikes of small lavender blue flowers from late May through June in Louisiana, with a second flush of flowers again in July or early August.