Editorial policy

The Hosta Farm is an independent reference site about hostas. This page explains where our information comes from, what we check, and what we do not do. It is supported by advertising and Amazon affiliate links.

Cultivar data: the American Hosta Society registry

Registration facts on cultivar pages — registration year, originator, registrant, parentage, section class, plant and leaf size, leaf and flower details — come from the American Hosta Society Registry, the International Cultivar Registration Authority for the genus Hosta. We hold registry data for 5,538 registered cultivars that have a page here. Each of those pages links to its registry record, so you can check the data at the source. Some names in our index have no matching registry record; those pages say so and show no registry data.

What we check, and against what

• Cultivar pages in search. Only 106 cultivar pages are open to search engines. Their text was compared with the cultivar's registry record (size, leaf colour and pattern, originator, flowers), and errors were corrected. Each of these pages shows the line “Last checked against the AHS registry” with the date of that check.
• Cultivar profiles. Longer profiles compare the registry record with the American Hosta Society's Hosta of the Year material and award lists, note where sources disagree, and list their sources and the date they were checked.
• Other cultivar pages show registry data with a short summary that has not been reviewed yet (see AI use). They are kept out of search engines until they are checked.
• Care and design guides are checked against university extension services, the Missouri Botanical Garden, the Royal Horticultural Society, the American Hosta Society and, for pet safety, the ASPCA. Updated guides list their sources at the end and show the date they were last updated.

Buying guides

We have not tested the products in our buying guides. Guides are organised by the task a product is for. Comparisons are based on product labels (including EPA registration and OMRI listing where they apply), manufacturers' manuals and specifications, and university extension guidance. Each guide says when you do not need to buy anything, shows the date Amazon listings were last checked, and carries a “How this guide was made” notice. We do not show ratings, prices or review scores we have not verified. As an Amazon Associate, The Hosta Farm earns from qualifying purchases; this does not change which products we list.

Photos and illustrations

Cultivar photographs come from Wikimedia Commons. We show a photo on a cultivar page only when the file was checked by hand, or when the Commons file name contains the cultivar's full name and no other registered cultivar's name. Files we found to show a different plant are excluded. Every photo is credited where it appears with its author, its licence (with version, linked) and a link to the original file page. If a photo has no author or licence information, we do not show it.

Where there is no such photo, a cultivar page may show a watercolor illustration generated with AI. It is labelled as an AI illustration and is not a photograph of the plant — do not use it to identify a cultivar. The illustrations on the home page and section pages are AI-generated as well and are labelled.

Images carried over from the site's earlier version whose author and licence were not recorded are not shown.

AI use

We use AI tools to draft and edit text, to translate the few Spanish and German pages, and to make the illustrations described above. The short summaries on cultivar pages were generated with AI from registry records; on pages that have not been reviewed yet, the summary is marked as unreviewed. Facts on pages we have reviewed were checked against the sources named on this page, and those pages show the date of the check. We do not present AI-generated text as personal experience and we do not publish product tests we have not done.

Corrections

If you find a mistake — a wrong size, a misnamed cultivar, a photo of the wrong plant, a broken link — write to [email protected] or use the contact page. We check the report against the sources above and fix confirmed errors; the page's “updated” or “checked” date changes when we do.

Dates on our pages

• Cultivar pages in search: “Last checked against the AHS registry: date”.
• Cultivar profiles: “Profile written and checked … on date”.
• Guides: “Published” and “Updated” dates.
• Buying guides: the date Amazon listings were last checked.
• This page: last reviewed 2026-10-06.