Bordering on the brilliant
THERE’S nothing like a touch of glamour for cheering up borders, and nothing does it quite so well as oriental poppies. One look at those huge flouncy silky-textured ballgown flowers puts you in mind of Hollywood in its heyday. Think Shirley Temple on sticks.
These eye-catching perennials are natural show-offs, with dense clumps of jagged, silken-haired foliage topped by exotic poppyheads measuring four to six inches across. What’s more, they are timed just right to plug the “difficult” six-week gap that can denude borders between the last spring bulbs and the main flush of summer flowers. There are dozens of varieties. By far the most fashionable is Patty’s Plum whose flowers are a light satiny mauve.
It’s not to everyone’s taste but I love it. Its great asset was that it went awfully well with the purples and blacks that were all the rage in perennial borders a few years ago. Lauren’s Lilac is another beauty that is slightly paler but just as desirable.
Traditional oriental poppies were always red; loud crimsons or bold vermilions that people nowadays can find a tad tricky to place in a sophisticated pastel border. But if you have an evergreen background that shows red flowers at their best, old faithfuls such as Goliath, Marcus Perry and the heavily fringed Turkenlouis are real lookers, with contrasting centres of shaggy black anthers and black blotches at the base of the petals. They will do you proud.
Beauty Of Livermere is another popular red but lacks the black blotches, which I think are a vital requirement.
Salmon-pinks are the easiest to place in most gardens; choose from the pale and delicate looking Mrs Perry through to the enormous shaggy, semi-double Garden Glory, whose petals look as if they’ve been crafted from crêpe paper. Also, there are some rare stunners among the delicate silvery pale pinks. Cedric Morris has such YEARS ago, as soon as the daffodils were over, conscientious gardeners would go round tidying up after them. First they’d snip off the dead flower heads, then they’d carefully knot the foliage into loops and secure them firmly with elastic bands.
It took ages, and unless you wore rubber gloves you ended up with your hands covered in unpleasant gooey slime. So a lot of people gave up or simply cut all the leaves off for a quick tidy-up then wondered why all their daffs stopped flowering.
Nowadays we know better.
Today’s view is that leaving the old flowers to set seed doesn’t weaken the bulbs as we once thought so there’s no need to bother. As for knotting the foliage or cutting it off, current wisdom is definitely against it. Daffs need their leaves to photosynthesise, making carbohydrates which fatten up the bulb so it reaches flowering size, and it can only do that if its leaves are left loose so they get maximum exposure to sunlight.
I know floppy daff leaves look petals that look like crumpled satin with dark maroon-black blotches, and Karine has very symmetrical saucer-shaped blooms almost like a giant Shirley poppy in palest pink with a deep pink blotch at the base of the petals. But don’t overlook the whites. Black And White has crisp, brilliant white petals round a sharply contrasting centre of black blotches and a perfect ring of bristly black stamens, like gents’ formal evening wear. Simply stunning.
You’d be forgiven for thinking something so sensational would be impossibly demanding to grow but nothing could be further from the truth. Oriental poppies are perfectly happy in a sunny border as long as the soil is rich and reasonably well drained.
They are hungry plants so a generous mulch in April and a good helping of general feed before and after flowering helps them keep up appearances.
Since the flowers are big and heavy they appreciate a little support, so it’s worth slipping a cage type support frame over each crown soon after the first shoots begin to break through in spring, but it’s soon hidden by the mound of foliage and actually improves the shape of the plant.
Most garden centres stock one or two of the most popular varieties but if in doubt check others listed in the Plant Finder. You’ll guarantee your garden its own Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers moment to open your annual summer show in style.
DON’T DIG UP YOUR DAFFS
messy but it’s for only six weeks while they complete their annual growth cycle.
After that, you can cut them off at ground level or mow over areas where daffs are naturalised in the lawn. But since it’s tall daffs that are the worst for floppy foliage, the secret is to grow them in places it won’t be a problem – in drifts under trees, in a wild garden or midway back in a large mixed border. If you want to move them wait until the foliage has died down then dig them up.
When the bulbs appear on sale in autumn treat yourself to some dwarf daffs for key positions such as containers and fronts of borders. My favourites include Jetfire, February Gold, Minnow and Hawera.
They are dear things between six and 10 inches tall with charming flowers and compact foliages that stay upright and look good even while dying down.
Unlike hyacinths and tulips, daffs are best left in the ground, not dug up and stored for the summer so they get my vote for the least-bother bulbs.