Groundsel bush, Baccharis

Description:

Blooms all along highways and the edges of wooded areas in the late fall. Feathery female flowers have a bright, showy white pappus ... a "parachute" that will later carry the seed on the wind. Evergreen. Likes moist and marshy areas.

Notes:

Along the highways, it's banks of privet in the spring, groundsel bush in the late fall ... both very common in the Southeast U.S.

Wikipedia:

Sunflower family, Asteraceae

Widely used common names include Eastern Baccharis, Groundsel Bush, Sea Myrtle, and Saltbush, with Consumption Weed, Cotton-seed Tree, Groundsel Tree, Menguilié, and Silverling also used more locally. In most of its range, where no other species of the genus occur, this plant is often simply called Baccharis.

Baccharis halimifolia is a shrub growing to about 12 feet high and comparably wide, or occasionally a small tree. Its simple, alternate, thick, egg-shaped to rhombic leaves mostly have coarse teeth, with the uppermost leaves entire. These fall-flowering Baccharis plants are dioecious, with male and female flowers on separate individuals. Their flowers are borne in numerous small, compact heads in large leafy terminal inflorescences, with the snowy-white, cotton-like female flower-heads showy and conspicuous at a distance.

Likes wetlands, salt-tolerant. The flowers produce abundant nectar that attracts various butterflies, including the Monarch, Danaus plexippus. These dense shrubs also provide wildlife food and cover.