These are some of the plants that I grow in my garden that I'm fond
of, proud of or have found useful.( Or I have pictures of!)
Index
Argemone Mexicana
This unusual annual poppy has spiky grey green leaves with veins marked
in grey. The flowers have four delicate pale yellow petals and red
stamens, and are followed by spiky seed pods holding numerous round
black seeds rather like small cabbage seeds. In my garden it self seeds
enthusiastically in the cracks in the terrace paving and flowers well
into the autumn.
Cornus sanguinea 'Winter Flame'
A lovely red-stemmed dogwood, the young growth in winter is very
striking being yellow at the base and changing to bright red at the
tips, hence the name. The leaves are rather ordinary mid-green in summer
but change to a beautiful salmon pink in autumn before falling. The
plant needs to be cut back near to the ground in spring in order to
produce the young growth which provides the brilliant winter colour.
Echinops Ritro
The Globe Thistle, this produces a clump of stems eventually reaching
about 80cm. The leaves are grey green, slightly felted and prickly but
not excessively so. The flowerheads develop at the ends of the stems,
small green balls which take on a blue tinge as they grow. Towards the
end of the summer they flower, small blue flowers which open at the top
of the ball first and gradually progress downwards. The flowers do not
last long but the blue colour remains for some time.
Echinops Sphaerocephalus
Similar to the previous plant, this one is much taller and the
flowerheads and flowers are pale grey rather than blue. Like Ecinops
ritro the flowers, when open, are attractive to bees and butterflies.
Macleaya cordata
Known as the Plume poppy, this herbaceous perennial has stems growing to
six feet or so; the leaves are handsome large, palmate in shape,
coloured greyish green on top and paler beneath. The stems are topped by
plumes of small fluffy white flowers which are followed by small
purplish pink seedpods which remain attractive into the autumn. It
spreads by suckers.
Onopordum acanthium
The Scotch thistle is a biennial forming a clump of greyish white long
spiky leaves in its first year. In its second year it grows rapidly,
eventually reaching eight foot or more, the leaves grow very large,
perhaps two foot long near the base. At four foot or so the stem starts
to branch, each branch eventually ending in a large, very prickly,
purple thistle flower which produces copious amounts of seed. It is at
its most attractive early on while the leaves are young and fresh; as
the flowers and seed develops the leaves become dry and shrivel and the
plant takes on an almost skeletal appearance, though still a striking
feature of the border. Once a plant has grown and seeded in the garden,
seedlings will appear in the following year and it is just a question of
selecting and nurturing those in the most suitable positions.
Stipa gigantea
Sometimes called Giant Oatgrass, this is a large grass with a basal
clump of rather stiff green leaves, two foot or so long. The flower
stems rise to four or five foot with large open many-branched golden
panicles of flowers. They open in June and remain attractive right
through the winter. My specimen of this grass grows in a rather dry part
of my very dry garden, and in more favouable conditions it would
probably grow bigger.
Stipa calamagrostis
Another striking and beautiful grass, from a clump of medium green
leaves rise many two to three foot flower stems bearing dense fluffy
creamy yellow flower heads. Like the previous plant these start to open
in June and remain through the winter.