Variegated ivy looks pretty tropical and stays green all year long. Thats the most tropical evergreen thing I can think of right now. Good luck!

Zone 8 is not tropical, so anything you plant that is truly tropical will die in the winter...therefore will not remain evergreen, unless you want to treat it like an annual.

However, there are many subtropical evergreen ground covers which will do great in zone 8 Texas. How large an area does it need to cover? How high does it need to be? Does it need to have attractive blooms?

You might try variegated confederate jasmin for starters. Also, some of the dwarf nandinas (like 'Firepower') don't get too tall and have nice reddish winter foliage. There's always the ubiquitous Liriope and smaller euonymous and ajuga. Not sure if some of the dwarf agapanthus would do well in your zone. There are some smaller gardenias which might do OK too.

Hi - Thanks tropicalzone and dave -
I just, needed some ideas of what to look for.
Maybe, I will find something at Lowe's.
tina_2

I'm not sure what this is called but it looks good and is evergreen

Also I have variegated vinca minors stay green all winter long. They are pretty invasive, but are nice groundcovers. As long as they dont get a lot of snow they stay evergreen, but usually if mine brown its from a very heavy snow load or temperatures below 10F. No matter what though, they always quickly regrow in the spring and flower ALL year, but mostly in the spring (during mild winters I have gotten flowers in January, this past winter was cold and I got 1 or 2 flowers in December, but they usually wont bloom that much in the winter).

That plant that Statenislandpalm posted looks like an Euonymus fortunei. And dollars to donuts it's "Moonshadow" variety. Which is a really nice looking groundcover, no doubt. Another great groundcover, and another euonymus as well, is "Emerald Gold" (at least, I hope I have the cultivar name right) because it gets gorgeous pink highlights when the weather turns chilly.

Let's see, other tropical looking ground covers ...
Lysimachia congestifolia and it's many cultivars are nice 'n bright. A lot of greens and yellows, but "Persian Chocolate" is gorgeous deep purple-brown.

Liriope, Ophiogon, and Mondo grass all make nice groundcovers, but to me they take awhile to fill out an area.

The regular vinca, stays green up in MA zone 5b for sure, so it has to be tough. Up there, we have it on a slight incline and the few purple-leafed ajuga that I planted two years ago have spread very aggressively throughout the planting of vincas. It is fantastic to see the 6" ajuga flower spikes rising bright blue above the dark green of the vinca. That ajuga did NOT die down, snow or not, even though it never seems to grow taller than 3 or 4 inches.

Another plant which surprises me here in Mobile was all three pots of heuchera (coral bells). After I removed the tarps I'd thrown over all my bunched-together ferns and bird-of-paradise and split leaf philodendrons to assess the damage of this winter, I saw three pots of heuchera looking as fresh as they did last fall. The cold did not touch them. Beautiful small plants, don't know if they will spread if placed in the ground though. And after the uncharacteristically persistent cold of this winter, even my beloved leriope was fairly limp and bedraggled. The FirePower nandina was all brilliant red and seemed to do very well with the cold.
Also, the holly fern did not succumb to the cold, and it does spread nicely planted in the ground.

In Mobile, aspedistra or cast iron plant is a taller ground cover, you might say. It survives nicely planted enmasse under the shade and surface roots of those huge magnolia grandifloras.I guess that means it likes dry shade. And I have a few variegated aspedistra which came from Plant Delights Nursery. Those strapping leaves always look tropical to me.

Thank goodness there is hope of spring around the corner, and I can soon be back in the garden to rethink some of my choices.

I was thinking vinca also. I've got a tropical bed I'm starting this year and wanted a wilder look and thought vinca would be a goo choice.