Plant for all seasons
Heather does all the hard work so you don’t have to, even in winter writes David Overend.
Most gardeners will do anything for an easy life, which is why heather (Erica carnea) has become one of the most popular plants to grow – particularly in winter when its intense colour can brighten up a dark day.
In fact, heather has become so commonplace that’s it’s easy to overlook its importance. Left to its own devices, a healthy plant can flower for months on end – even when it’s covered in layers of snow and ice.
There are more than 200 cultivars of winter heather, with bloom times ranging from October to March.
Established plants need little care, but all types should be pruned immediately after flowering.
A hard shearing when their blossoms fade will help the evergreen foliage stay compact and bushy and set the stage for more flowers next winter.
Leave heath unpruned and it will brown up, turn twiggy, and lose its good looks. Shear it annually, right after the flowers have started to fade, and it will flourish and stay attractive for a decade or more.
And if you don’t have room in beds and borders, grow E carnea in containers because you can then ensure that the potting compost in which they root suits them.
It also means that you can move the pots to follow the sun, because heather loves to be in the sun, even when it’s just a pale, weak winter sun.
Erica isn’t that other common heather, or ling, Calluna vulgaris, because the latter, although stunningly colourful and pretty in summer, doesn’t flower in the midst of winter or even in spring, so it’s not a patch on its hardy, all-year-round cousin.
And it hates any trace of lime in the soil, whereas the majority of Erica can tolerate most soils as long as they are relatively well-drained. There are some which can’t grow in lime, but they are more than outnumbered by those which can.
As for colour... there are reds, purples, golds, whites, in fact, just about any colour. If you choose with care, you can have some form of heather flowering every month of the year.
And they also come in a variety of heights, from those which won’t look out of place in a rockery, to the mighty E arborea, which can top six feet, so there’s a heather for any garden.