PLANTING IDEAS I FEATURE
Some perennials keep the show going for months on end
David Hobson has suggestions for long-lasting perennials.
IMAGINE A GARDEN fi lled with beautiful flowers, ones that bloom every year, all season long.
Now, you could just plant annuals, of course, but the process has to be repeated every spring. And there’s the expense and the work involved — planting in spring, digging out in fall.
So why aren’t there plants that live forever? I don’t know of any, although I once saw a yew tree in Scotland that’s said to be between 3,000 and 5,000 years old.
>> That’s impressive, but most plant lovers would be happy to have a few that at least stick around as long as new patio furniture and look just as good all summer long.
In the recurring (or perennial) debate over annuals versus perennials, it does seem like perennials are the better deal. But wait. Sadly, although garden perennials do come back each year, most don’t flower any longer than necessary, some only for a few days or for a week or two. Three or four weeks of bloom is, on average, a reasonable expectation for most, and then they have the nerve to look scraggly and unkempt for the rest of the season, unless redeemed by particularly attractive foliage.
There are, however, a small number of perennial plants that do act like annuals. Ones that stay in bloom from spring until fall are rare, but some will at least perform for a couple of months or more, either early-to-mid or mid-to-late season.
Some will have a first flush of blooms followed by intermittent flowers throughout the rest of the garden season and, as many annuals do, will produce even more if spent flowers are removed.
The sun-loving Dianthus, also known as pinks or carnations, is a good example, especially newer hybrids like ‘Witch Doctor’ that flower in spring and continue until the first frost in fall.
As spring flowering bulbs begin to fade, one of the first long-blooming perennials to appear in my garden is my friend Mrs. Bradshaw, or rather Geum chiloense ‘Mrs. J. Bradshaw.’ The species originated in Chile and was brought to Europe in 1826, >>
>> but it was the early 1900s when Mrs. J. Bradshaw made an appearance. George Whitelegg, the Bradshaws’ family gardener, noted an exceptional plant in a box of geum seedlings he’d been given and no doubt thought it would be a propitious move to name it after the boss’ wife. (This was the 1900s.)
Since then, other hybrids have been introduced and more are on the way. With names like ‘tangerine,’ ‘mandarin’ and ‘marmalade,’ it’s clear the available colours are on the warm side of the spectrum, from yellow through orange to almost pure red. These are trouble-free plants, rarely bothered by pests or disease, and they bloom well into summer. It’s not a plant that produces masses of flowers; they pop out on tall, wavy stems, appearing from a distance like a blob of colour floating above the velvety, low-growing foliage.
A plant with a similar growth pattern — and one of my favourites — is Scabiosa columbaria, or the pincushion plant. There are a number of varieties, but the star is ‘Butterfly Blue,’ selected by the Perennial Plant Association as the perennial of the year in 2000. It’s a three-season plant, blooming from mid-spring to fall. The foliage is a soft, greyish green while the 50-mm (two-inch) flowers, prized for cutting, are lavender-blue with what I like to call a raggedy but charming look to them. The plant is also free of disease and resistant to insect pests, yet irresistible to butterflies.
Also popular with flower arrangers is Astrantia major, or masterwort.
The genus name comes from Greek, describing the star-like flower heads, although they’re not unlike a smaller version of scabiosa flowers. It’s a taller plant, though, growing knee high, and prefers the same conditions — moist soil in sunny or partly shaded area of the garden.
Flowers range from pink to red — look for ‘Ruby Wedding.’
For the hot, sunny and parched side of the garden, it’s hard to beat old-fashioned yellow yarrow (Achillea millefolium) with its bright, disk-like flower heads that grow tall enough to look you in the eye, blooming from summer into fall. The hybridizers have been busy, and there is now a range of available colours in shades of pink, yellow and red, typically shorter in stature and perhaps not as rugged as the original.
The above are moderately long-blooming plants, but there are a few that are outstanding.
Blooming in June and still with flowers in October, Coreopsis verticillata, or thread leaf coreopsis, is definitely one of the longestblooming perennials, and recent introductions are impressive. I have three varieties in my garden and they do indeed behave like annuals, flowering from spring until fall.
The ‘Route 66’ variety is a bushy plant full of 50-mm (two-inch) flowers featuring a burgundy centre that spills out onto yellow petals. It’s vigorous and hardy, which isn’t surprising as it’s said to have been discovered growing (or hitching a ride) near Route 66 in Lucinda, Pa., but has since been improved and patented. (If you’d like to adopt a road theme, look for Coreopsis verticillata ‘Sunset Strip’ as well.)
My second coreopsis is ‘Zagreb’ and it is just as impressive, but with daisy-like yellow flowers in a shorter, mounding form. Both have the delicate, finely textured foliage.
New to my garden is ‘Mercury Rising’. Rather than being discovered at the roadside, it was hybridized after 10 years of work from a different species, Coreopsis rosea, by the renowned plant breeder Darrell Probst. It’s easy to grow and a must-have plant in any garden. It’s lush and bushy with flowers the colour of a nice Merlot with an orange button in the centre. Attractive to butterflies and honeybees and blooming from early summer well into fall, what more could a gardener ask? Give coreopsis a trim in mid-summer to promote even more flowers.
If red wine is a favourite colour, there’s a less floriferous plant that should satisfy a craving. Apparently discovered in his own garden by a Belgian postman, ‘Postman’s Pride’, a sedum, produces gorgeous flowers from late summer into fall. It hardly matters that it’s bereft of blooms early in the year thanks to the dark burgundy, succulent foliage. Like all sedums, it can get floppy if grown in soil that is rich and moist. If this happens, chop it by half in June and it will grow into a stockier plant. Not so stocky is Gaura lindheimeri, and aptly named because the genus name is from the Greek word gaurus, meaning superb. And superb it is.
The plant is bushy but airy, ideal for the flower bed or container. Beginning in early summer, this plant is still blooming as late as mid-October. The flowers are small, in shades of pink to white depending on variety. They’re borne on long, elegant stems arising from the less noticeable green-to-maroon foliage. Native to southern Louisiana and Texas, the sight of flowerfilled stems waving in a breeze landed it with the common name whirling butterflies, though it’s also been called Indian Feather and Lindheimer’s Clockweed, the latter thanks to botanist Ferdinand Jacob Lindheimer, a plant collector for Harvard University. I always thought gaura was an easy to remember name for this plant, but just >>
>> to confuse the poor gardener, plant classifiers have decreed it should be renamed Oenothera lindheimeri. Apparently, it’s taking a while for that name to catch on as it’s still marketed as Gaura lindheimeri.
It may sound like a perfect perennial, but there’s always a catch. Occasionally it overacts by croaking in the third act. This plant is a perennial and is rated for zone five — this area — but it is often marketed as an annual plant as there’s a risk it may not overwinter, at least in the first year.
Regardless, it has reappeared beside my driveway every spring for the past 15 years so I can vouch for it. I suspect it helps that it spends the winter under a deep pile of snow, and this may be the secret. Plant where snow accumulates or mulch well before winter and it should do fine, but don’t plan on moving it as it resents being disturbed once established.
These are just some of the favourite long-bloomers but there are a few others to consider: shrub roses, perennial geranium, veronica, penstemon, black-eyed Susan, columbine, alchemilla, astilbe and echinacea.
And although colourful perennials may be desirable, don’t forget other sources of colour, plants like heuchera with their amazing foliage, hostas and ferns, or the dramatic Japanese Blood Grass (Imperata cylindrica ‘Red Baron’).
It’s said that gardens evolve over the years from bright colours to more subtle shades, or one could completely forego the rest of the spectrum and have a garden in countless shades of green.
To paraphrase the poem The Garden by 17th century poet, Andrew Marvell: No white nor red was ever seen So am’rous as this lovely green . . . Annihilating all that’s made To a green thought in a green shade.
David Hobson gardens in Waterloo.