Our Favourite Plants for Brightening up Summer Shade Shade and Woodland Plants Group Committee Members
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Our favourite plants for brightening up summer shade Shade and Woodland Plants Group committee members Fig. 1 Hydrangea macrophylla ‘Blue Wave’ s we write these Peucedanum ostruthium young leaves can be cooked A plant profiles in the ‘Daphnis’ (fig. 2) looks and eaten and the root used heatwave of summer 2018, horribly like the variegated to flavour certain gins and garden shade seems even Bishop’s Weed that goes other alcoholic beverages. more necessary and desirable. everywhere if you plant it Probably not ideas to be Going from blisteringly hot out in the garden – though tried at home! sun to an area where the I’ve always loved it in a big ‘Daphnis’ forms fairly tidy temperature is several degrees pot standing in a summer clumps growing 20–25cm cooler and you can literally shade bed. tall and has spread to around feel the transpiration of the This plant is a lot better a metre, so far. In early trees is sublime. behaved, however, even if it summer the flowers look is called a masterwort like like Queen Anne’s Lace Ground Elder, Aegopodium. on 50cm stems. For me it Shade is no longer I’m sure it’s my imagination, grows well in an average, considered a problem but I love it because one woodsy-type soil in full- area to plant – in fact, minute it’s not there and I’m to-partial shade, but I’m with the wide range of looking at a patch of spring experimenting with a bit of shade-tolerant plants with shade perennials gently going it in full sun and moist soil to over… then next minute see how it copes. It’s bone- wonderful foliage now beautiful creamy-gold-edged hardy, surviving –13°C this available, shade has to be leaves suddenly appear as if year. Propagation is by my seen as a real advantage. out of nowhere, followed by preferred method of digging lovely delicate white flowers. a bit up with a spade. I got my plant from a Why the name ‘Daphnis’? We start with our chairman, Northants HPS Plant Fair It seems Mr Ferret and his Nigel Parkes-Rolfe, who is in 2014. Apparently it is a friend had named a new also the Derbyshire Group’s fairly ‘recent’ introduction aster as ‘Chloe’ (said to be representative with the HPS from France, where it was very nice as well) and the Conservation Group. He likes found in a garden in the ’90s. names are from the title of to squeeze as many plants According to the blog of one a 2nd century Greek classical as possible into his relatively of the guys who found the romance. Who knew that? I small suburban garden. plant, Philippe Ferret, the certainly didn’t. 14 I am always so pleased I also sat the plant on 5cm to see Cypripedium of grit. I left it unprotected parviflorum(fig. 3) come the following winter and it back each year because didn’t reappear until two the first year after planting springs later. With that in ©Nigel Parkes-Rolfe it didn’t come back at all. mind, I now mulch and Every year since it has cover it from December to steadily increased in size, February using a big plastic along with my appreciation dome cloche sat on a metal of it. I know it’s not meant to Peony support frame. Not be the most difficult orchid wildly attractive, I accept, to grow in the garden but it’s but it seems to do the job the sheer size (7x7cm) and and saves the dog flattening beauty of the flowers that it while chasing pigeons! really do it for me. There are now eight Fig. 2 Peucedanum ostruthium I have looked at photos flowering stems on my plant. ‘Daphnis’ of C. parviflorum online Here in Derbyshire their and mine doesn’t always noses first show in April, it seem to match, so I suppose finally flowers in late May it could be a hybrid; but and just about lasts until I don’t really care. It’s a July. North American species Dactylorhiza foliosa x ©Nigel Parkes-Rolfe and even their botanists say saccifera (fig. 4) Dear reader, it is extremely variable but while I have still got your that it’s broadly similar to attention, please can I seek a the British and European bit of your expertise? I was natives. asked to recommend two I purchased the plant at a plants but I would really like 2013 Plant Heritage Spring some feedback on this one – Plant Fair at Felley Priory in there seems to be very little Nottinghamshire. It was in information on it. an 8cm pot with one stem Again it’s a plant I love Fig. 3 Cypripedium parviflorum showing. The seller had and it grows really well for split the plant from one in me, as you can see. However, her own garden, it was the is this a case of ‘nice plant, only one on the stall and she shame about the virus’ or wanted a very reasonable are the leaves meant to look £5, so it had to be worth a like this? ©Nigel Parkes-Rolfe try. The only advice she gave I purchased it at an AGS me was to make sure it had Show in April 2015; it didn’t good drainage. have yellow marks initially, I’ve said that this orchid they appeared later that year. was easy, but perhaps I just Looking online I see there need to qualify that a bit. are two dactylorhizas with When I first planted it in similar yellow leaf markings the dappled shade of a silver and they are being sold as birch I was careful to mix a ‘Aurea’ or ‘Variegata’. lot of bark and grit into my Can anyone help me, Fig. 4 Dactylorhiza foliosa x acid-side-of-neutral clay soil. please? saccifera 151 spring, topped with terminal bell-like flowers. D. longistylum ‘Night ©Sue Lander Heron’, from the famous Heronswood Nursery, originated in China and was selected by Dan Hinkley for its wonderfully sinister dark-hued stems that remain throughout the winter. A classy plant. D. cantoniense ‘Blueberry Bere’ was found at altitude in Manipur, north- east India. It’s an exciting new colour break having plummy-pink/lilac flowers. D. longistylum ‘Green Giant’ was discovered by Dan Hinkley in Sichuan province; its stems emerge pink, white Fig. 5 Disporum aff. cantoniense ex Guizhou ‘Leigong Chocolate’ and green and mature into green, growing to 120cm. Sue Lander, vice chairman read of them being planted But my favourite has to of the Group, has for once underneath a Norway spruce! be D. aff. cantoniense ex experienced moist shade this I grow several forms in Guizhou, collected in 2010 spring. neutral, woodsy-but-well- by Paul Barney of Edulis Disporum (‘di’ meaning drained soil in part shade. Nursery and now named two and ‘spora’ meaning According to the books ‘Leigong Chocolate’ (fig. 5). seed) are otherwise known they are evergreen in milder It flowered for me this year. as Fairy Bells. They are one climates, relatively disease A plant to be drooled over. of my favourite perennials free and scented. The flowers Pittosporum illicioides for adding height and grace are usually greeny-yellow var. angustifolium (fig. 6) to my shady plantings. In the but recently different flower was found in the mountain Colchicaceae family there colours have been discovered. forests of Taiwan. This is an are around 20 species which Unfortunately I no longer evergreen shrub tolerant come from a huge area from have the name of my first of shade – in fact the leaves northern India to Japan, south acquisition – when I was elongate in shade to 20cm to Indonesia and north into new to gardening, keeping in length but only 2cm in the Russian Far East. The the label or logging the width, dark green and glossy. North American species have name wasn’t important, but Useful in the garden to shine now been reclassified in the of course it’s now highly out from a shady position. genus Prosartes. relevant to identify and be The flowers are pale yellow Disporums are able to recommend a plant. and fragrant. Growing up to rhizomatous, have deeply Arising from a golden, 2m, mine is planted a metre veined foliage, bell-like flowers jagged-leaved petasites, the away from an imposing and attractive berries in the Disporum attains a height of glaucous conifer, therefore the autumn. They are easy to over a metre with bamboo- situation is very dry and shady. grow, even in dry shade once like stems that emerge like I have just started to ‘lift its established – I have recently asparagus spears in late skirts’ to reveal a pleasing 216 underplanting of epimediums, wood anemones, winter aconites and snowdrops, and to provide a host for climbers ©Sue Lander later in the year. I first saw it in the garden of Crûg Farm and was fortunate to purchase one, almost 10 years ago, from Sue and Bleddyn Wynn- Jones. Although it enjoyed a much higher rainfall in north Wales, my plant seems to have adapted well to its new situation in Essex, needing Fig. 6 Pittosporum illicioides var. angustifolium no additional watering and coming through every winter sun. Many evergreen shrubs this very narrow foliage is unscathed. It is a very tolerant, drop their old leaves in spring, hardly noticeable when shed. elegant shrub, useful for dark which can be unsightly in Altogether a lovely shrub for corners though it will grow in a small tidy garden, but shade.