Always check with your local Agricultural or Forestry Extension Service before doing any extensive planting. There are several kinds of salt, however sodium chloride (NaCl), which is table salt, is the most common.

The Four Most Common Kinds of Salt Damage to Plants: One is wind borne salt spray from the ocean or blown from highways that are salted for ice control. The second is from ocean salt water flooding, which eventually will run off. The third is from salt put on streets, sidewalks and driveways that runs onto adjacent plants. The forth is using irrigation water that has too much salt in it.

The following is a list of plants that are generally considered somewhat salt resistant, although how the plants do varies in different parts of the country. (Many of these, when damaged, will recover and put out new growth.)

Salt Resistant Trees

  • White spruce
  • Austrian pine, Japanese black pine
  • Sycamore maple
  • Red oak, Black oak
  • Willow
  • Birch
  • Russian olive
  • Sophora

Salt Resistant Shrubs

  • Juniper
  • Bayberry
  • Firethorn
  • Tatarian honeysuckle
  • Inkberry
  • Forsythia
  • Rugosa rose
  • Sumac
  • Privet
  • Sea buckthorn
  • Natal plum
  • Bouganvillea
  • Oleander

Salt Resistant Grass Varieties

  • Creeping bentgrass
  • Bermuda grass
  • Zoisagrass
  • Tall fescue
  • Perennial ryegrass
  • Chewings fescue

Credit: Mother’s Garden