If you are looking for something a bit different for your garden then perhaps this vegetable version of “Cousin It” from the Adams Family could be just the ticket! It is a weeping form of Norway Spruce and will trail along the ground or spill over a bank unless trained up a stake. It can …
This climbing relative of the humble grape vine has it all in my humble opinion so why haven’t you planted it yet? Its summer foliage is a rich green with a burgundy reverse (you always see the back through the window so it is important). If it is growing in semi to full shade the …
Yes I know I’ve done this Genus twice before but I promise this will be the last time unless I find some more cold hardy species! This one is a suckering shrub up to 1.5metres tall in my climate and it will wander quite a distance (you have now been warned!) but it wouldn’t stop …
The autumn is on the way and before long the leaves will start to turn so don’t be left out make sure you have some lovely Japanese maples in you garden. Even a tiny plot or a cool balcony would be enough for this restrained cultivar so there are no excuses! It will slowly make …
Well here we go again, another much loved plant has had a name change. So if you are looking for this stunning shrub in a book more than a few months old then look up Mahonia lomariifolia and it will have the same description as it is the same plant. What ever the name is …
A truly remarkable intergenetic hybrid between Chilopsis linearis and Catalpa bignonioides breed at the Botanic Garden of the Uzbec Academy of Science in 1964. Although both Genera are in the same family they appear quite different and a cross would seem unlikely and the result possibly less that ornamental. However this plant has proved to …
This genus consists mainly of tropical shrubs and climbers but there are a few cold hardy representatives and I’m out to collect them all if I can, and this species was the first I found and still one of my favourite shrubs even though it has some characteristics that would mark it down in many …
This small shrub or even perhaps sub-shrub is a great asset to any garden. It will grow in almost any sunny well drained site and can be used as an individual or as a low border hedge that is a great alternative to lavender. The foliage is deciduous and from spring to autumn is a …
Until just a few moments ago when I was about to blog this plant I would have done so under the name Scilla greilhuberi but such is the flux in plant nomenclature that it doesn’t pay to assume anything! What ever this rarely grown Iranian Blue Bells botanical name is it is a great garden plant. …
This amazing plant has a lot of bad press to get over so I see it as my job to do so! For a start it isn’t going to give you a rash, the species that people are allergic to is now not even a Rhus but appropriately called Toxicodendron. It does however sucker strongly …