Pens pals Late summer’s friendly faces
STRETCH the summer season with penstemons and add a punch of colour to your garden.
They produce flowers like those of the foxglove and are at their peak between August and October. Garden centres often promote them, along with asters, fuchsias and hardy salvias at this time of year.
Many popular varieties are bred by Ron Sidwell, known for his bird series.
There is Blackbird, with reddish-purple flowers, the purple-black Raven, pink and white Osprey and Flamingo, which is bright orange-pink with a white throat.
As he was once vice principal of Pershore College in Warwickshire, the national centre of horticulture excellence, penstemon breeding soon became a speciality there.
The variety Garnet was raised in 1918 by Swiss nurseryman Hermann Wartmann. It produces intense crimson blooms that rise high above semi-evergreen foliage for more than six months of the year.
Plantsman and writer Graham Stuart Thomas gave it the descriptive name of the colour of its blooms.
Boost
Penstemons grow in a variety of soil types but most prefer alkaline and do well in full-sun and in fast-draining soils – they hate waterlogging.
Plants are generally pest-free and do not even need staking. Give them a boost in spring with a handful of rose fertiliser.
They self-seed everywhere, but if you do not want the bother, cut off seed heads in autumn. Leave most of the foliage intact over winter to protect the tender crown.
Surrounding the plant with a dry mulch of bark chippings will also protect the roots.
As a precaution against winter losses, raise replacement plants from cuttings. In July and early August, look for semi-ripe wood produced this year and cut away Q
7-10cm pieces from non-flowering shoots.
Trim the base of the cuttings underneath a leaf node, then reduce any large leaves before putting in pots or trays of gritty compost. compost Leave in a shady place to root, which takes several weeks, then pot up individually indi in John Innes compost. Overwinter Ov in a cool greenhouse and plant p them out in April.
You can also successfully grow penstemons p from seed. These can be directly sown in the garden w where you want them to flower in e early summer. Seedlings emerge in te ten to 21 days and when they are a few centimetres tall, thin them to allow 30cm between the plants.