Achilleas to suit all gardens
These easy-to-grow perennials come in a range of colours, suit most soils and work well with most perennials – what’s not to love?
Achilleas meld well into a border of other perennials. A prolific flowering plant, the small, simply shaped blooms nestle tightly together to form broad, flat heads that are loved by bees. The flowers are carried on stiff, well-branched stems with pretty, feathery, grey-green or mid-green foliage. They grow into a handsome upright plant, or a neat mounding clump. For me, the real joy of an achillea is in the layered effect created by the flowers. The flat heads form tiers of colour that’s particularly useful for catching the eye, especially when planted in front of upright perennials and shorter plants with spikes of flowers. The only other plant that does this to any degree is sedum (ice plant), but these don’t bloom until very late summer while achilleas flower from July right through to late autumn.
Available in a range of summery colours and various heights, the most useful border varieties are those descended from our native yarrow, a plant commonly found growing in short grassland. This is important to remember when choosing which variety to grow. Achilleas containing the Latin title
millefolium don’t like rich or damp soils. In these situation they can be short-lived. This is the sort of soil I have in my garden, but I’ve found that achillea
‘Moonshine’, with easy-to-combine, soft yellow flowers and tall, rich yellow ‘Coronation Gold’ and A. filipendulina ’Gold Plate’ survive for years without any problems. The other consideration is to make sure achilleas aren’t over-shadowed by other plants. Competition makes them sulk. However, anyone with free-draining soil, including a soil that’s hot but not too dry, can grow most varieties. There are lots of red and orange varieties, which are particularly useful for adding hot colours to a border. ‘Terracotta’ has rich orange flowers, ‘Forncett Fletton’ has soft-red flowers, while the flowers of ‘Paprika’ and ‘Walther Funcke’ are vermillion or orange-red flowers. Like many varieties, the flowers change in colour as they age. The centres enlarge and become more yellow as the petals fade. If you don’t want this to happen, then ‘Summerwine’ and ‘Red Velvet’ stay red. There are some lovely pink achilleas. These vary from soft to rich pink, the richest being
‘Pomegranate’ with bright pink flowers. A. millefolium ‘Lilac Beauty’, ‘Pretty Belinda’ and
pale-pink ‘Apfelblüte’ all fade to pastel pink or near-white, while the flowers of peach-pink ‘Peachy Seduction’ become cream.
White’s less common, unless you count the native A. millefolium, which can be bought commercially in a good selection named ‘White Beauty’. The old cottage variety A. ptarmica ‘The
Pearl’ is entirely different to the plants already mentioned. The small, buttonlike, pure-white flowers are borne on branched, upright stems with slender, mid-green leaves. Unlike the others, this can be a bit of a ‘runner’ but, in common with the others, it makes a great cut flower.
Like all perennials, if you buy achilleas in pots they can be planted throughout the year. As bare-root they’re best planted in spring, when the ground gets warm. Don’t fertilise them as the soil will become too rich and they’ll quickly die off. Just cut the flowers back in autumn if you want to neaten up your border or leave the dried flowers on the plant for winter shape.