Plant of the Month – June 2013

Geranium psilostemon

This is a favourite geranium of mine and I do love hardy geraniums. However, they could occasionally be accused of not being exactly exciting. You could say they are the Magnolia Dulux of the floral world – they fill the gaps in an inoffensive, backdroppy, generally pastel manner. You could say that. But honestly, you’d just be wrong and I’d point to Geranium psilostemon to make my point. The pictures don’t really do it justice because that magenta and black is a ‘zing!’ combination. I’ve seen it paired with lime green (Lady’s Mantle maybe, or a spurge) and on a bright sunny day that’s almost painful.

Big, bold and beautiful

As hardy geraniums go it’s a bit of a whopper – 3ft or so and sometimes in need of staking. Like many others of its kin it likes sun or partial shade and it does fine in our clay soil but should be equally happy in anything that’s well drained.

There is a smaller geranium with similar flowers called ‘Ann Folkard’ which brings along it’s own lime green leaves to zing with, thus making it a cool plant combination in one plant. Which is just a bit like laughing at your own jokes at a party.

Sometime I’d like to plant Geranium psilostemon with orange Californian Poppy and Lady’s Mantle. But not anywhere I’ll see it with a hangover.

All it needs is some orange and lime-green. Honest!

Plant of the Month – May 2013

Anemone sylvestris

Every May the Anemone sylvestris emerge and put on a glorious show for a few weeks, starting about the end of April. They are rather like our native wood anemone (Anemone nemorosa) on steroids having similarly divided leaves and nodding white flowers but reaching a foot or so tall instead of a few inches.

I hear rumours of repeat flowering in autumn although mine have never acheived this feat. They spread about quite a bit and I understand that in lighter soils than ours they can be a bit of a pest, but such a pretty pest.

Anemone sylvestris

Natives of meadows and woodlands they are happy even in quite deep shade, though here they are in partial shade. One or two clumps are in full sun and although they are a bit less vigorous than the ones in the shadier spot, they seem to be doing ok.

Nodding in clusters with the church in the background they bring to mind a crowd of choirboys with their heads bowed. If my Dad’s tales of being a choirboy are anything to go by I shall soon find them behind the shed having a crafty ciggie.

Plant of the Month – March 2013

I’ve been trying to convince myself and my colleagues that it’s Spring. ‘Look’ I say, hopefully as the wind bites my face, ‘I can prove it because we’ve got these little friends.’ and I point to the Primroses.

Primula vulgaris AKA Primrose

They brighten dingy corners and once they are done the leaves sit there being fairly unobtrusive. They cope with most soil as long as it’s not dry, and like sun or partial shade. I often dig up a few clumps and spread them about the place as I do with snowdrops.

When I was a child I used to pick their flowers and put them in tiny little vases. As an adult I still do this and they look particularly lovely with heartsease or other small violas.

It’s quite common to see the pink variety available (Primula vulgaris ‘Rosea’) and we have white ones in various spots in the garden but really, I love the gentle yellow ones best of all.

Plant of the Month – November 2012

Let’s have some ancient fossil tree autumn colour!

Ginkgo biloba

Ginkgo biloba is awesome for many reasons, one of which is its ancientness. For three million years or so Ginkgo biloba has been the only Ginkoales on the planet. As a garden tree it’s quite big, ultimately reaching around 30 metres tall although there are dwarf and columnular varieties that would be great in a small to medium sized garden. With its mobile pale green leaves it makes a lovely dappled shade and then turns this beautiful butter yellow in the autumn.

It’s fully hardy and will grow in most well-drained soils. It likes sun and the autumn leaves look great in a the sideways autumn sun, although the specimen pictured is in a north facing spot and seems to be coping.

Lovely leafage

Really though, is there any more reason required to grow this plant than those leaves?

PS. Sorry this is a rather briefer than normal but I’m busy this weekend and if I don’t post it now it’ll be horribly late!

Plant of the Month – October 2012

This month I’ve chosen a shrub that really lights up the garden at this time of the year:

Cotinus ‘Flame’

Very aptly named!

The vibrant orange and red of the autumn colour of this shrub really brings in some cheerfulness even on the gloomiest day. Plant it in a spot facing West to pick up the low rays of the autumn sun as it sets.

These ones face east for a shot of morning sun.

These plants are quite young and ultimately, if left to their own devices could reach twelve to fifteen feet tall or more. However, Cotinus respond well to hard annual pruning, producing larger leaves. Now that these ones are getting established I’ll be a bit mean to them in the Spring after the last frosts, cutting them right down. A Cotinus ‘Grace’ I’ve been treating this way springs up to about eight feet in a season and I may end up doing this biennially if these don’t respond quite so vigorously as the ‘Grace’.

The leaves are an attractive light green for the rest of the year and tiny flowers are borne in airy inflorescences which give Cotinus its common name of ‘Smoke Bush’. It does well on our clay and will be happy in most soils as long as they’re not sodden. Go on, give it a spot. It’ll cheer you up just as things are starting to get a bit soggy and depressing.

Help! My garden’s on fire!

Plant of the Month – September 2012

This month I’ll be having a peek at one of my favourite shrubs:

Viburnum opulus

Also know as the Guelder Rose, Viburnum opulus is a shrub or small tree which is native to Britain. It has lovely white flowers in Spring, followed by bright red berries in September and often a glorious red autumn leaf colour too.

It seems it will grow pretty much anywhere. The one pictured gets rather soggy every winter and thrives in the clay soil, but I’d give it a try almost anywhere but real extremes. They grow to about five metres tall and a bit less than that across; there is a compact variety called (with great imagination) ‘Compactum’ which reaches about 1.5-2m. There is also a yellow leaved variety available called ‘Aureum’ and its leaves are a pretty yellowish lime green, but I’ve found it’s rather prone to scorching.

At home in a native woodland, or an ornamental scheme, grown as a shrub or perhaps on a single stem as a small tree Guelder Rose is a really adaptable, beautiful plant. You know, I think it’d look great with a clematis scrambling through it, preferably one with attractive seedheads for a really good autumnal display…

Plant of the Month – August 2012

Sometimes you want something bright and easy, which perhaps even borders on the thuggish and provides a big honking chunk of colour in August when the early summer plants are starting to make everything feel a bit prematurely autumnal with their seedpods.

Persicaria amplexicaulis ‘Atrosanguinea’

Persicaria amplexicaulis ‘Atrosanguinea’ forms a clump of quite attractive pointed leaves which throw up lots of cheerful pink-red flower spikes in late summer. It is certainly not a delicate plant and you might occasionally have to beat it back a little, maybe even with a chair and a whip.

Persicaria in the border

Here I’ve planted it in my soggy bottom border and it’s bulked up a huge amount since last autumn so don’t go planting it in a small space next to things which are worried by competition. Fortunately the Glyceria maxima ‘Variegata’ which you can see in the background is not phased by this and is squaring up to the Persicaria in a slightly worrying manner.

The Persicaria is about 4 foot tall with its flower spikes on and likes a bit of moisture in its soil. Here it’s in a reasonably sunny spot, although the border faces north and once the Cornuses in the back get going (assuming the Persicaria and Glyceria let them…) they’ll be partially shady, but they should be fine with that.

Trying to look sweet – we know the truth…

It’s a bit of a favourite in meadowey prairie type schemes and I can see why. Those flower spikes have a translucence that works really well with grasses and other wafty flowers, but the plants themselves are as far from wafty as you can get. There’ll be no fainting and smelling salts here!

Plant of the Month – July 2012

This month I’ve chosen a plant I’ve grown from seed and have nurtured to maturity with my own fairish hands.

Salvia sclarea (Clary Sage)

Clary sage is a perennial to which the word statuesque might be applied if you were feeling like it. I have to admit to having forgotten quite how big it is before planting it where it is. I had forgotten it’s almost my height (5 foot) and two to three feet across so there may have to be some judicious re-jigging of this border come autumn time. The internet hoojamajit is telling me it’s biennial or short lived perennial but it’s always been perennial in my experience.

I’m growing it in our clay soil, improved by digging in organic matter. I would expect it to fail on anything heavier or more waterlogged but it should be fine or even better on drier and sandier soil. Having said that I would assume it would be more likely to be biennial and perhaps a bit smaller on less meaty soil!

The clump of large leaves is quite attractive in its own right earlier on in the season and the stems stick around for quite a while giving height to the border Although this season is so damp that I expect everything to collapse in a heap of grey mould sometime soon.

Salvia sclarea (Clary Sage)

I grew these beauties from purchased seed and they didn’t need any special treatment. The whole plant has quite a strong almost ‘sweaty’ smell when bruised which can be a bit overpowering and which a lot of people find unpleasant. Their seed has the interesting property of producing a mucilage in water which was historically used to treat eye complaints, hence ‘Clary’ or ‘Cleareye’ sage and it appears in Culpeper’s Herbal under that name.

I can certainly say that putting this Salvia in my new border has played a major part in it having the feel of a fully grown border even in its first year. Hurrah for Salvia sclarea!

Plant of the Month – June 2012

Knautia Macedonia

I get asked about this striking Knautia all the time. It flowers from early June through the Summer, loves a sunny spot and will do in most neutral to alkaline soils. It self seeds a bit, but not aggressively and is the most wonderful shade of deep red which seems to fit into almost any colour scheme – somehow managing to go well with warm bright colours and cool pastels.

The plant itself is a fairly chunky thing, but not overly so and as the flowers are held well above on thin stems it has that translucent-ness which allows it to weave itself among other plants, and be ok right at the front of the border.

Its seed heads stay as these delightful lime green pincushions for a good while before they go brown and so later in the season you have the red pincushions alongside these bright green ones which is really rather stylish. (Although you might want to take my definitions of stylish with a pinch of salt!)

There is a pastel pinky mix called Knautia ‘Melton Pastels’ or something but why have pink when you could have that red?

Plant of the Month – May 2012

This month’s flower is one I’ve loved since childhood and perhaps my choice is a bit predictable, it being a staple (along with tulips) of pretty much every Chelsea show garden I’ve ever seen (and certainly most of the ones I’ve liked) but I’m not going to apologise for that. It’s unashamedly romantic, perhaps sometimes even a bit twee but I love it, so there.

Aquilegia vulgaris

A.v. ‘Nora Barlow’ was one of the first plants I really fell in love with when I started gardening ‘properly’:

It grows in one of the rose borders which I stuffed with herbaceous perennials early on in my time at the towers. The other aquilegia I planted in that border is the dramatic ‘William Guiness’:

Good old William and Nora have been getting busy in the border and have had several love children, though I also suspect Aquilegia vulgaris may have been joining in at times (oh I say!):

They are happy in most soils and like sun or partial shade and will seed around, although the babies won’t ‘come true’ from their parents, you can see from the examples above (and take my word for it, there are lots of others) that the results are often interesting in their own right. Strict deadheading would prevent this if you wanted to (but I reserve the right to call you a spoilsport).

I grew some from seed that the packet claimed were a ‘Nora Barlow Mix’ (so they should have all had the spurless double shape which is so distinctive) and while they were double and very pretty, they weren’t a Nora Barlow type so I would caution ‘buyer beware’ when it comes to seed packets. I planted the results in my new border last autumn:

If I was a granny I’d be quite happy with one of these bonnets!