Bring colour and life to your plot with late-season echinaceas
Bring colour and life to the garden with these amazing late-season plants
Whether you call them coneflowers or echinaceas, these charming daisy flowers are impossible to ignore right now. At their peak of blooming, and available in a rainbow of colours, it’s the perfect time to indulge in the most fashionable flower of the year.
Back to the beginning…
Echinaceas have been grown in British gardens for more than a century. They were discovered in America soon after the first colonists arrived. The most familiar species, E. purpurea, famous as a medicine for its immune-boosting powers, was discovered in 1699 and seed sent to the UK. It never quite became as popular as it should have been, perhaps because the flowers were a dusky pink, with rather droopy petals compared with other American autumn daisies, such as bright rudbeckias, though echinaceas, confusingly, were originally called rudbeckias!
There are nine wild species though none have ever become as popular as
E. purpurea, perhaps because the others have tap roots and are difficult to divide.
They all grow in open, sunny places, often in poor soils with low rainfall, and the various species grow wild from the warmest parts of southern USA north into Canada. Their rough leaves are unpalatable to grazing animals and their tough, woody rootstocks help them survive prairie fires, which help to reduce shrubs and trees that would shade them out. Their natural companions are grasses and other low, herbaceous plants. All have similar, pink blooms and are easily recognisable as echinaceas, apart from
E. paradoxa which has yellow flowers. It’s this species that has given rise to the new colours we now know and love so much.
New developments
Although new and improved echinaceas were slowly developed over the years, mainly to improve the shape of the flowers by breeding them with horizontal rather than drooping petals, the choice of varieties didn’t change a lot until the end of the 20th century.
Echinaceas were becoming popular in the 1990s as better varieties were introduced. Their flowers are loved by bees and butterflies and the plants are drought-resistant, so they attracted attention from gardeners who wanted something sustainable.
Two years stand out as huge leaps in the fortunes of echinaceas. In 1997 the first double-flowerer was introduced. Called ‘Razzmatazz’, it was discovered in a crop of echinaceas grown for cut flowers and it caused a sensation. We’d never seen anything like it! Being a double sport of an existing variety, it wasn’t bred to support heavy double flowers, so it often needed support, but it was a huge hit and the forerunner of all the doubles we see today.
Crossing the black sheep of the family, E. paradoxa, with others wasn’t achieved until a breeding programme in Chicago released ‘Art’s Pride’ in 2003. Combining pink and yellow species, this had rustyorange flowers. It opened up the huge possibilities of what could be done, but unfortunately it wasn’t a strong plant and is rarely seen today.
Since these achievements, through the breeding work of nurseries in the USA and the Netherlands, a kaleidoscope of new and exciting vibrant colours and beautiful double flowers have been produced.
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Cultivating echinaceas
Situation: Echinaceas are native to the prairies of North America. They’ve developed to stand up to drought, wind and grazing. They shrug off winter cold but the one thing they can’t stand is soggy conditions. They’ll grow in clay or sandy soils, provided they’re in full sun and that the soil is well drained. If water lays on the soil in winter then echinaceas are not going to last in your garden, unless you grow them in a raised bed or in pots. Their rough leaves are not especially attractive to snails and slugs but in wet soils, where these pests are abundant, you may lose echinaceas in winter as the molluscs eat the young shoots. They’re not fussy about soil pH as long as it’s not too extreme.
Planting: Planting is the same as for anything else. Make sure the pot is soaked before planting, dig a large hole and mix in some compost, soak the hole, plant, making sure that the pot level is the same as the soil, water and check on watering if it doesn’t rain. Deep planting isn’t a good idea since it may lead to rot, and avoid thick mulches around the plant, especially in winter. If planting in pots use John Innes No 3 compost. Plant in late spring or early summer, when they’re actively growing. But if one takes your fancy now then they should thrive if you take a little extra care. Most reasons why echinaceas fail to survive winter are either that they’re too wet or that small plants were planted in autumn. Many otherwise attractive echinaceas consist of a small pot with one or two flowering stems and no basal leaves or shoots. These are unlikely to survive because the small plant is putting all its effort into flowering and none into making new growth that will establish the plant for next
year. When buying at this time of year look for large clumps in pots with a mix of flowering stems and leaves at the base making new potential flower stems for next year.
Maintenance: Divide established clumps in spring to keep them growing actively and prevent them dying out. Echinaceas make longlasting cut flowers. Cut them when the flowers are newly opened. They also dry well for winter displays. Echinaceas are often recommended for their winter silhouettes and seed heads that attract seed-eating birds. As winters seem to get increasingly windy and wet, most old echinacea stems tend to rot and get destroyed so they’re rarely ornamental. If you want echinaceas to keep blooming it’s sensible to deadhead flowers to prevent seed production. Many new echinaceas, especially doubles, set little or no seed, which makes them bloom for longer, but they’re of no use to birds.