Late August is always memorable thanks to Actea japonica (Cimicifuga japonica). I have had this stand under a massive Norway spruce for almost two decades and it never fails to please. Capturing it in a photograph, however, has always been a challenge. This year I used my cell phone and I like the results.

Hardy October Blooming Perennials

I searched all the pictures I have taken in October over the last six years and found far more blooming perennials than I could mention here. Many of them begin blooming in August or September but carry on well into October such as Japanese anemones. One of my favorites is Anemone x hybrida ‘Whirlwind’. There are also lots of different Asters and ornamental grasses that meet this descripton. For example, I particularly enjoy my ground hugging Aster ericoides ‘Snowflurry’ in combination with various upright stonecrops like Hylotelephium x ‘Autumn Joy’. Curiously, despite the name (Autumn Joy) the upright stonecrop is finished blooming by October, but remnants of the flowers still make a nice companion for my Aster. 

 Aster ericoides ‘Snow Flurry’ flowering with Hylotelephium x ‘Autumn Joy’ on October 14^th.

But what about the flowers that could be called denizens of October? What are some flowers that, when everything is dying, suddenly you see this thing blooming amongst the ruin of season's end? There is one plant that especially comes to mind, Aster tataricus (Tatarian Aster). It is defined by its late blooming season. Since 1992 I have photographed it in bloom on seven occasions and as late as October 28^th, but never have I photographed it earlier than October 4^th.

 Aster tataricus as seen on October 13^th.

Another hardy perennial whose flower show is almost exclusively confined to October is a species of monkshood called Aconitum carmichaelii. A great variety of that species that Kingwood and I both grow is called Barker’s Variety.   

 A species of monkshood, Aconitum carmichaelii, blooming at my house on October 11^th.

I can’t include in this list a couple of the most glorious fall bloomers, a couple of non-hardy shrubby sages called Salvia leucantha (Mexican bush sage) and Salvia greggii (Texas sage), even though they are frost resistant and never stop flowering in the fall until they are frozen. Many gardeners find them so satisfactory they are willing to start fresh with new plants from the garden center every year. There is, however, another sage called yellow sage (Salvia koyamae) that has a similar late season flowering persistence, albeit subtle. It makes a nice groundcover even in heavy shade and has a pleasant display of yellow flowers well into October. 

 Salvia koyamae blooming at my home on October 7^th.

Finally, in this summary, there is the fall crocus. This is not to be confused with the autumn crocus which also blooms in the fall. The autumn crocus, despite the common name, is in the genus Colchicum and is widely planted for its typically pink flowers that emerge in early September and often last until October. The fall crocus, on the other hand has smaller flowers of varying color more like the spring blooming crocus but that almost invariably bloom in October. For me, the allure is that they are usually a pleasant surprise. Just when I think everything in the garden is just about done just the flowers, no leaves, of the fall crocus emerge among the fall colors and fallen leaves. There are several species, but the two I am most familiar with are Crocus kotschyanus, which I grow, and Crocus orchroleucus which I enjoy at Kingwood. 

A species of fall crocus, Crocus ochroleucus, blooming October 26^th at Kingwood Center Gardens

Thriving Siberian Iris

It is time to get this blog going again! A lot has been happening in my garden, Kingwood's garden, and gardens I visit and follow; so let's go:

I revisited irises over the last week in anticipation of using them as a topic for my next Kingwood Center Plant Talk television show. My special infatuation with irises started about ten years ago during which I acquired a flood of various iris for work and home. The enthusiasm tempered after a few years, so now I am looking back at which irises survived and thrived over those ten years and which have diminished and/or died.

First introduced in the 1930's 'Tropic Night' offers the old fashioned if yet gratifying traits of being tall, narrow leaved, basic blue and most importantly from the standpoint of this essay, vigorous. 

While gratified by the ones that hung in there with me I am surprised at how many have dwindled away under common circumstances. This is especially true of Siberian irises. The exciting new color forms have been especially susceptible to 'failure to thrive". Under what I would call the normal bumping and bruising of garden competition many Siberian iris just don't compete. It is primarily the old, species-type blue flowered Siberians that thrive. Some of the successful competitors are tetraploids, such and 'Blue Pennant', 'Coronation Anthem', and 'Teal Velvet'. Others are old diploids with the typical tall stature, narrow leaves and dark blue flowers like 'Tropic Night' and 'Tealwood', but all five of the varieties mentioned are more or less the basic blue you would expect from a Siberian iris. The white colored 'King of Kings' and the yellow 'Welfenschatz' (forget the ubiquitous 'Butter and Eggs') do a pretty good job, but, alas, would almost never be seen at a garden center. Garden centers offer horrible choices in Siberian irses. There is the default Siberian iris  ('Caesar's Brother') which does very well and is that old typical blue diploid I spoke of above, but other than that it is a total roll of the dice whether you get a Siberian iris that will thrive in a dense garden.

'Coronation Anthem' Siberian Iris, a long term survivor

'Welfenschatz' is certainly the most obscure variety mentioned in this article, but it is the best yellow of several I have tried and it is still available on line. 

'King of Kings' has been with me for about a decade and it performs beautifully, if perhaps not as vigorously as something like 'Tropic Night'.  

Then there is the issue of the leaves standing upright or flopping after flowering. The floppers not only look bad but drown their neighboring plants. You will have to dig for information about this essential trait, and don't bother digging at the garden center; they don't know. As I recall all the varieties I mentioned above do not have a late season flop problem.

There is an easily accessed group of iris specialists who will not only have these otherwise obscure but superior varieties, but some will also tell you which ones will stand upright throughout the summer. If you want good Siberian iris other than 'Caesar's Brother', do your research and order by mail from a small scale iris specialist or just buy 'Caesar's Brother' and be done with it.

'So Van Gogh', a clever name, an unusual color combination, but where did it go? Two years, maybe three and it was gone. It failed to thrive.

Wary Exhilaration

It is exhilarating to plant a plant that was previously unknown to me and see that it not only survives but thrives and looks good doing so. I continue to be overwhelmed by the range of choices of plants offered up for rock gardens, most of which I am relatively unfamiliar. The problem is that most are unsuitable for my hot summer rock garden, but I don't know which ones. So when one of my most recent set of recruits does very well in my rock garden I celebrate. Most recently Hutchinsia alpina (Pritzelaga alpina) (Chamois Cress) has fit this success mold.


Hutchinsia alpina gratifying in its adaptability to my garden and a bit ominous in its vigor as it starts only its second year in the garden.

But now as its vigor is displaying itself this first spring after its first winter I wonder if this isn't going to be another of those great rock garden plants that eats the rock garden. I have several. They have the frustrating habit of overwhelming my more demure plant jewels before I realize it. Gypsophyla cerastioides (Alpine Baby's Breath), Dianthus deltoides  'Arctic Storm', Geranium 'Biokovo' (I should have known better; its all out of scale), Cymbalaria muralis (Kenelworth Ivy, I did know better; it arrived uninvited), Campanula poscharskyana  (Serbian Bellflower, I knew better but thought I could control it). These are representatives of the overly prolific rock garden plants that are consuming my gardens. Will Chamois Cress be another?


Dianthus deltoides 'Arctic Fire' is in danger of overwhelming its more demure neighbors such as in this case, Saponaria pumilio

A great performance for another context, this Geranium 'Biokovo' is all out of scale and too aggressive for this garden.

Kenilworth Ivy is one of those cute little plants that sneaks into your garden, you think its cute for a while and then it gets everywhere.



Gypsophila cerastioides (Alpine Baby's Breath) Too much of a good thing.

 

Campanula poscharskyana (Serbian Bellflower) is busily pushing out everything around it.

Perspectives on Ways to Garden

I think that gardeners who are paying attention are becoming less certain of what a “proper" garden (as an English friend used to say) actually is. I have been reading a fairly new book that Noel Kingsbury wrote with Piet Oudolf called Planting, A New Perspective. It is a provocative book on the topic of plantings that emulate, in many respects, natural plant communities except they are aesthetically designed and they utilize ornamental plants which do not necessarily share common ecosystems. I have experimented with this type of planting and remain mystified by how to sustain them. I also recently read a book called Bringing Nature Home by Rick Darke and Douglas Tallamy. Their brilliantly instructively illustrated book emphasizes gardening predominantly with native plants in stable associations. It was very convincing. I see similarities between the two in style but not in substance. Those two approaches remind me of the multiplicity of approaches to gardening and all the associated consequences beyond the desired appearance. 

In this image below of Kingwood Center in Mansfield Ohio the calendar is dictating the end date of a garden still in full bloom. It seems ridiculous at first blush, but if there is to be a spring display the summer crop must come out in time to plant the bulbs.

 

The next image of a seasonal planting in Connecticut is a classic, but today’s sustainable gardeners might say it’s a rich man’s conceit, a display of resources at his command. And they would be right, but does that make it a bad garden?

 

Below is a rose garden on June 23^rd  at the Columbus (Ohio) Park of Roses. Here is an entire garden dedicated to plants that probably need more care and attention than any other plant a gardener is likely to choose, yet here it sits out of bloom and contributing almost nothing at a time when most gardens are in their glory. But who would dare disparage a rose garden?  

 

On the other side of the gardening pendulum we see in the image below what seems to be a beautiful informal, sort of wild looking planting at the Berlin Botanical Garden. Look closer. I took this picture largely because it includes, Equisetum (horsetail) which is about the most obdurate weed I know. It will be a permanent and aggressive fixture in that garden until everything is removed and all traces of the Equisetum are destroyed. I have had similar experiences repeatedly with Agropyron repens (quackgrass), which is probably easier to control than Equisetum. It is this sort of experience that mystified me about the Kingsbury/Oudolf approach. Removal of the horsetail would be about a draconian two year project with no guarantee of success.

 

Below is a lovely looking scene at my home of blooming Stylophorum diphyllum (celandine poppy). Unfortunately it represents the failure of an attempt to create a beautiful and stable community of native and floriferous garden plants. One species is taking over and driving all the other species out in the process. Nevertheless I see the Stylophorum diphyllum as a valuable tool in a Darke/Tallamy type gardening where it could be confined by bordering shrubs.

 

Then we come to this proud community of cultivated plants that seem to be stable, growing in a Berlin park. (The first six or seven feet of perennials up to the shrubs) If they are indeed a compatible community, it represents the work of a very knowledgeable gardener. But what has been achieved aesthetically compared to a more conventional garden? Was I evaluating this garden at the wrong time (July 9^th) or is it kind of nondescript? 

 

My conclusion is that there is room for all of the above. There is no such thing as a “proper” garden. We work in a multitude of circumstances with many ambitions and goals. While I certainly have my preferences I applaud the achievement of all of the gardening goals represented in the pictures above and the skills required to achieve them.

My Most Recent Favorite Plant

Pseudofumaria alba on 11 September 2013

Pseudofumaria alba seedlings from the above plant on 2 May 2014

 

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I am fascinated by my two growing seasons experience with Corydalis ochroleuca, or apparently more correctly Pseudofumaria alba, or I could improvise a common name like White Rock Fumewort. Anyway, as my common name suggests, they are known for growing on cliffs and rock outcroppings, but now are also known in Europe as an escapee of cultivation on walls. I am advised by the literature to regularly deadhead my plants in order to extend the bloom time through the spring and into the summer. They are said to be hardy to -13 degrees Fahrenheit.

None of that corresponds with my experience. I bought the three plants in the spring of 2013 from Digging Dog Nursery and planted them in a slightly raised bed near but not in a rockery. They grew well and bloomed abundantly from late July through September and probably until they were frozen in October. In the spring of 2014 following a winter with minimum temperatures that may have approached -13 degrees Fahrenheit, the three original plants were dead. As the spring progressed I noticed seedlings that looked like they were from my Fumewort, so I moved some around and protected the others. By the end of the summer they were gorgeous full-grown plants. As I write this on 22 October they are still in full bloom, and they have been blooming since about the end of August, as I vaguely recall. I didn't get around to photographing them until 10 September.

Now I have three locations, all close-by each other where I am growing the plant. One of the spots is a heavy clay overlain with an inch or so of rotted organic matter. The other two are in rich, fairly well drained garden soil. None has found its way to the rockery all around them.

So I await the results of their second winter and spring. Perhaps these will perform every year as non-hardy self sowing perennials. If so, that is fine with me because they quickly grow from seed into wonderful garden plants in one summer. When I have a successful experience with a plant that is so contrary to what I am led to expect from my readings I am always fascinated, and when the results are so gratifying I am especially so.

Money Well Spent in Lexington, Kentucky

I had the opportunity to see several private gardens in various tours of this year's Perennial Plant Association annual meeting. There was plenty of beauty and livable garden space to go around, but one struck me for making so much from such a conventional setting. Louis and Betsy Hillenmeyer live in a typical, albeit up-scale, subdivision. Modest lots of, I would guess about a quarter of an acre looked to be standard. The Hillenmeyers made the most of theirs. Arriving at the house one was taken with the elegant walls, full but uncluttered front garden and the manicured Boston ivy enveloping the house.

A beautifully constructed stone wall with clean and simple ground cover and a row of small trees gave the yard a gardened look without being busy or difficult to maintain.

The carefully crafted Boston ivy looks nice but the owner admitted to biweekly pruning. Unless that pruning gives him pleasure, I think that's too much of a commitment to repetitive handiwork.

 

Walking around the back yard one discovers a far greater investment in elegance, comfort, livability, and artistic flare than expected. The space between the lot line and the side of the house was small enough that the neighbor's front porch was cheek and jowl with the Hillenmeyer's side yard. To both neighbor's credit each of their side yards complemented the other making a lovely enclosure, especially for the deep low front porch of the neighbor. 

 

The Hillenmeyers, however were far from lacking in elegant outdoor living space.

 

Off the back porch of the house a nice sense of enclosure was created by the walled-in garage and driveway areas while open views of the garden-encircled back yard also offered a nice sense of openness.

 

A private and intimate enclosure around an outdoor fireplace offered amazing privacy for the relative density of the housing development.  

And this little courtyard by the fireplace is divided to offer almost a forecourt for the trip into the sanctuary. The garden was full of what I would call condensed journeys.

 

And finally this transition from the driveway into the aforementioned private space is typical of the heavy investment in creating not only lovely enclosures but also the satisfaction of moving gloriously from one space into another.

 



Diverse Growing Conditions

Over the last several years I have delved into rock gardens of various sorts, gravel gardens, trough garden, meadow gardens and my latest, a "well-drained" garden. They have all been and continue to be great learning opportunities. I am introduced to new challenges of all sorts and get to grow plants that I had previously killed, just admired from afar, or had never even heard of. Below is a sample.

Well-Drained Garden:

I have killed Euphorbia x martini 'Ascot Rainbow' (above) three times. Each planting site had better drainage than the last on the theory that the plant, which the label claims to be hardy in zone 5, died from being too wet in the winter. The third effort was in the very sandy soil of my well-drained garden. Rather than take the next step and put a roof over the plant for the winter I am concluding that the claims on the label are exaggerated and it is NOT hardy in zone 5.

On the other hand my well drained garden prompted me to experiment with previously unfamiliar Silene laciniata, Dianthus amurensis, Muhlenbergia reverchonii, and Stachys lavandula all with gratifying success. Pictured above is the rather insubstantial but engaging Silene laciniata.





Gravel Garden:

I didn't set out to have a gravel garden. I built a rock garden/retaining wall along the edge of my gravel driveway and was thrilled and fascinated to see what decided to migrate into the driveway. In the above picture you can see that forget-me-nots (Myosotis sylvatica) descended from the wall to colonize the gravel. Others that have done the same include Verbena 'Annie", Corydalis cheilanthifolia, Festuca glauca, a dwarf form of Lychnis flos-cuculi, Aetheonema schistosum, and Phemeranthus calycinum. Now I am starting to experiment with conscious introductions to complement the many desirable volunteers.

Above is the Phemeranthus calycinus (aka Talinum calycinum) as it makes an interesting wash over the garden with its easily edited and unobtrusive seedlings.



Fragrance

Abelia mosanensis (Fragrant Abelia) is an underused must-have for fragrance.

Close-up of Abelia mosanensis

 

Nothing compares with the a well fragranced rose such as Rosa 'Gertrude Jekyll'

Fragrance in plants is a multi-faceted story. I never fail to stop to smell the 'Gertrude Jekyll' roses when I walk by their flowers while at work. And I still mourn failing to move some peonies with me that were so fragrant their cut flowers could perfume a large room. In retrospect I never appreciated how rare that intense fragrance is in peonies. On the other hand I am repeatedly irritated by claims of lovely fragrance that in-truth require deep inhalation with nose squarely imbedded into the flower. And, of course, there is the long established kvetch about breeders neglecting the fragrance trait in otherwise fragrant plants like roses (and peonies, I suppose).

The sense of smell powerfully influences our memories and can bring back long forgotten experiences. The smell of petunias, which is more distinctive than fragrant, immediately brings me back to my early childhood.

Fragrance can transform an evening. For example the smell of the flowers of Brugmansia (Angel's Trumpet) brings back an early evening walk in Balboa Park in San Diego. As I was walking along I was suddenly aware of a most wonderful fragrance which I was able to trace back to a Brugmansia tree. The flowers that emit their strongest fragrance in the evening bring a special delight to what is probably the most emotion laden time for visiting a garden. Nicotiana sylvstris, flowering tobacco, is another memorable plant that contributes to the pleasures of an early evening in the garden, and night-blooming cereus is worthy of a special evening pilgrimage to an enlightened greenhouse.

Another sort of fragrance experience is provided by the likes of Abelia mosanensis (Fragrant Abelia) and Viburnum carlesii (Koreanspice Viburnum). These two shrub's fragrance can transform an entire backyard. Curiously around my part of the country the Abelia most often seen is Abelia x grandiflora, a half hardy shrub with forgettable fragrance. (I really can't recall.) On the other hand Abelia mosanensis is fully hardy and made our deck a sensory delight for about two weeks this spring.

Boon and Bane

Symphytum azureum is not your grandmother's comfrey. Here it is in bloom on May 9th.

The mass of blue at the top of  the picture is Symphytum azureum on May 4th demonstrating its ability to function as a groundcover and suggesting its potential to spread.

 

This October 24th picture demonstrates the ability of Symphytum azureum to grow through thick mulch and for its leaves to persist well into the fall.

Symphytum azureum (The common name (comfrey) is very misleading. This is NOT the comfrey that most people know.) It is one of those plants that is both exceptionally useful and a nuisance to get rid of. I am just coming off about a ten year honeymoon with the plant where everything it did pleased me, so I am surprised at how little is seems to be known and offered. Curiously, a Google search brings up mostly sites outside of the U.S. An issue over its proper name may be one reason.

It spreads slowly. It isn't what you would call invasive. Inexorable would be a better description for its slow but relentless spread throughout a suitable growing site. So now after a decade it has reached the boundaries of where I want it to be, but I find it does not come with an off switch.  It would not be very compatible with mixed perennial plantings. I fear it would insinuate itself into most anything herbaceous, although I imagine larger plants could readily grow through it. By the way the web site for the German nursery Lorenz von Ehren says that prompt deadheading will slow its spread.

What has been exciting to me is that it is both attractive and very successful at developing a dense stand under the heavy shade of a sugar maple and a massive Norway spruce. For the very patient or the free spender it makes a great groundcover for the shade. The catch is that it must be contained (or perhaps diligently deadheaded).

On the whole it is a very useful plant that would bring considerable joy to gardeners, especially where an attractive solid stand of a highly shade tolerant groundcover is wanted.

The Wow Factor

 

 

 

Gentiana verna

Sometimes plants just knock your socks off when you first have success growing them. Jeffersonia dubia certainly had that affect on me as did Gentiana scabra. Now another Gentian has bowled me over, Gentiana verna. I am growing it in a trough garden with excellent drainage, and it is blooming after its first winter. I read that it is short lived, and I see no mention of self seeding so I guess I had better enjoy it while I can. What an amazing blue!

Inverted Growing Season

Cyclamen hederifolia flowers emerging through Carex platyphylla foliage in September

Cyclamen hederifolia in full leaf in mid January, finding plenty of growing room, growing with the dormant Carex platyphylla seen in the previous image

Arum italicum fruiting in August with conspicuously dormant leaves.

 

Dentaria (Cardamine) diphylla still looking fresh in March after being around all winter and before going dormant in the summer

 

Sternbergia lutea blooming in the fall as its leaves emerge from dormancy

I grow at least four perennials that emerge in the late summer or fall, remain green all winter and then go dormant as summer approaches (Dentaria (Cardamine) diphylla, Arum italicum, Sternbergia lutea, and Cyclamen hederifolium). Weird. I suppose that makes sense in a Mediterranian climate where the winters are mild and moist and the summers are hot and dry, and that is exactly where three of these four are native.  But somehow they survive in climates with cold winters and relatively moist hot summers.  Dentaria diphylla, on the other hand, is native to the eastern U.S. So where did it acquire this inverted growing season behavior? I bring this up not for botanical reasons but rather horticultural. How do you take advantage of this habit to enhance your garden? I mean, what a gift to have plants that grow when others aren't. They need to be paired up with compatible companions, but there's the rub.

I pride myself in my efforts to orchestrate the sequence of emergence and decline of perennials in my garden and have several combinations that I shamelessly tout as exemplary. But, alas, this growth habit I am calling "inverted" is challenging. I think I found a nice combination for the Cyclamen. I combined it with Carex platyphylla (Silver Sedge). The sedge is low growing enough that when the otherwise dormant Cyclamen sends up its flowers in mid summer they poke through the sedge and make a nice display. As the Cyclamen leaves are emerging late in the growing season the sedge leaves make room for them as they go dormant. It is all very tidy, but I haven't been able to do anything comparable with Arum italicum or especially Dentaria diphylla. (For hardiness reasons I grow Sternbergia in a pot.)  Arum italicum produces stalks with bright red fruit in August when the leaves are gone. It makes an interesting affect on bare ground, so there is a reward for not finding a sort of mirror image growing companion, but I would be more satisfied if I could. I have been growing Dentaria diphylla for six or seven years and only recently realized why it was so unsatisfactory in the summer. I just have to apply myself to this challenge. That (and so much more) is what I love about gardening.