Aroma therapy
Winter shrubs with scents so heavenly they’ll remind you of a perfume counter
AFEW years ago, I was exploring a garden noted for its winter interest when I overheard a couple pondering the origin of a strong, sweet scent that filled the air. I watched them wander up and down a border, until they eventually discovered the source was a tangle of bare, brown twigs with inconspicuous flowers.
The plant was Lonicera x purpusii ‘Winter Beauty’, a deciduous shrubby honeysuckle that forms a large, spreading thicket of stems. Reserved for much of the year, it makes its presence felt in December by producing creamy white blooms that pack a perfumed punch that belie their size and looks.
This honeysuckle, and the closely related Lonicera fragrantissima, are typical of many winter-flowering shrubs with scented blooms. Unlike roses, lavender and other fragrant stars of summer, those that make noses twitch as the mercury starts to plummet generally have small, fairly nondescript flowers.
My advice is not to get hung up on aesthetics but to embrace these plants for their ability to delight the olfactory senses. In my opinion, scented winter shrubs are nature’s air fresheners, masking the odour of damp soil, rotting leaves and decaying plant matter and giving
They’re nature’s air fresheners, giving us a reason to go outside
us a good reason to venture outside when the weather is cold.
Early winter is a great time to introduce scented shrubs to gardens and some of those offered by garden centres are likely to be in full flight, allowing you to treat outdoor sales areas like the perfume counter of a department store. Sniff different specimens before snapping up your favourites.
Among the most potent shrubs are sweet box (sarcococca), a small group of evergreens with spidery white flowers that have a floral perfume with vanilla notes. They’re easy to look after and aren’t fussy about where they are planted – they’ll do well in shade or even full sun, as long as the soil is moist.
I have two belters in my front garden that ambush passers- by with their seductive scent. Sarcococca confusa forms a rounded bush of shiny green leaves and has clusters of white flowers, while Sarcococca hookeriana var. digyna has slender, pointed leaves and threads of pink-flushed flowers.
Witch hazels ( Hamamelis) are deciduous shrubs that produce their filament- l i ke flowers on naked stems, usually between January and February. They come in shades of yellow, red, orange and purple, with a perfume that’s most noticeable on still, frosty days. It varies from light and citrusy, to strong and spicy.
They prefer moist, well drained acidic to neutral soil – avoid dry, chalky or soggy ground. Some books recommend witch hazels for partial shade but they’ll produce more flower buds in an open, sheltered position. Alternatively, raise in 18in pots filled with John Innes ericaceous compost.
Other winter winners include Vi burn umxbodn an tense ‘Dawn’, with its clusters of light pink flowers held on bare stems, and Chimonanthus praecox, whose small yellow blooms are almost transparent. The shoots of Edgeworthia chrysantha are topped by rounded, canaryyellow flower heads from February into early spring.
Perhaps the showiest of all scented winter shrubs are mahonias, with glossy, sharply toothed leaves and robust stems topped with arching, upright or densely clustered sprays of yellow flowers. These boast a perfume much the same as lily of the valley.
Mahonia ‘Winter Sun’ is a mediumsized shrub that produces a succession of bright yellow flowers from November until March, while ‘Lionel Fortescue’ forms a large shrub crowned with 16in-long, boltupright sprays.
Don’t relegate scented shrubs to a distant corner where you rarely set foot. Place them close to doors and pathways, so you can enjoy them every time you step outside. But don’t overdo it – too many different scents may clash.