Description
Riot of lilac colored star-shaped blooms May – June over this short, trailing mound of leaves.
Riot of lilac colored star-shaped blooms May – June over this short, trailing mound of leaves.
Riot of lilac colored star-shaped blooms May – June over this short, trailing mound of leaves.
$9.25/pot
BuyShort purple spikes in June-July
Size: 3” x 24”
Care: sun in well-drained soil
Native: Europe & Western Asia
Size: groundcover, rock garden, herb, fragrant foliage, thyme lawn
Thymus from the Greek word for “odor” due to the plant’s fragrance. Ancient Greeks made incense with thyme. This species since at least 1753. Acc’d to Parkinson in 1640 this remedied hysterics in women. Wm. Robinson wrote,”nothing can be more charming than a sunny bank covered with” Thymus serpyllum. LH Bailey extolled it as “prized as an evergreen edging and as cover for rockwork and waste places …The leaves are sometimes used for seasoning.”
OUT OF STOCK
Brilliant orange with purple spots, Turks’-cap type, reflexed petals (tepals), blooming in late summer to early fall.
Size: 10’ x 12”
Care: Sun in moist to moist-well-drained, acidic soil
Native: from VT to Fl & west to Mississippi River, Wisconsin native
Lilium was named for the Greek word for smooth, polished referring to its leaves. This collected before 1665. In his 1665 book, Flora, seu de Florum Cultura John Rea, nurseryman and author, called it the “Virginia Martagon.” Sold in America’s 1st plant catalog, Bartram’s Broadside, 1783. L.H. Bailey (1913): “The most magnificent and showy of native North American species, well worthy of extensive cultivation.”
$3.75/pot
BuySmall purple flowers atop tall leafless stems from July to October. Great see-through blooms for growing in back, middle or front of the garden.
Size: 3-4’ x 8”
Care: full sun in moist, well-drained, fertile soil - self-seeder
Native: South America
Awards: Royal Horticultural Society Award of Merit & Missouri Botanic Garden Plant of Merit.
Introduced to garden cultivation from its native Buenos Aires in 1726 by the Sherard brothers.
OUT OF STOCK
Green flowers in summer then, “conspicuous in winter when covered with its grayish white fruits which stay on the branches until spring.” Bailey “The leaves turn a fine brown-purple in the fall, but the berries are the thing – pewter in color, with a texture like those Fourth of July sparklers of childhood memory, they have a delicious fragrance.” Allen Lacy.
Size: 9’ x 10’
Care: sun in any soil
Native: Canada to Southeastern U.S. No pruning needed but can be pruned at any time of year, if desired.
Wildlife Value: Berries relished by chickadees, red-bellied woodpeckers, swallows, Titmouse, catbirds, bluebirds, Northern flicker & yellow-rumped warblers. Bayberry thickets also provide nesting sites for songbirds, offering excellent protection from predators.
Probably 1st collected for gardens by John Bartram (1699-1776). Offered for sale in Bartram Garden’s 1783 Broadside, America’s 1st plant catalog. In 1800’s considered “very ornamental in the shrubbery.” Fragrant leaves used for potpourri, abundant berries used to make candles. Good road-side plant, salt tolerant. Berries used to make candles. Boil berries (drupes) to melt wax coating. Collect wax from surface of water. In American Medicinal Plants Charles F. Millspaugh noted that “Candles made from this wax, though quite brittle, are less greasy in warm weather, of fine appearance, slightly aromatic, and smokeless after snuffing, rendering them much more pleasant to use than those made of either wax (paraffin) or tallow (animal fat).” 1892.