Category: Winter interest
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oxalis species
Hated by many due to the weedy species many Oxalis make great rock garden or pot plants with attractive leaves and stunning flowers. The winter growing species are all on the move now and looking good so put aside your preconceived ideas and enjoy these stunning long flowering plants. Here are just a few
Stephen Ryan
Disporopsis pernyi
This charming woodlander from Asia has glossy rich green foliage on arching stems rather like a small Solomons Seal below which it produces drooping white and green bells in spring which are then followed by blue-black berries. a cool moist aspect is the go in much the same way as you would treat a Hosta.
Stephen Ryan
Clethra fargesii
This large Chinese shrub can reach 4metres each way and if you have the right aspect and enough space it certainly pays its way! Its white lily of the valley style flowers are produced in midsummer and are beautifully fragrant with a musky scent. the dead flowers hang like copper bangles and the autumn foliage
Stephen Ryan
Rubus cockburnianus
It is not every nursery owner that would recommend a Blackberry to their clients, but I am not every nursery owner! The Ghost Bramble is a thicket making arching shrub with grey green leaves and small white flowers which really comes into its own in winter when the plant is bare and its white coated
Stephen Ryan
Puya mirabilis
The Genus comes from Central and southern America and is in the pineapple family but unlike many of the Genera Puya is a cool to cold climate group and so are ideal in gardens in southern Australia. most are frighteningly spiny often with recurved spikes that will let you in but not let you out!
Stephen Ryan
Oxalis flava
This complex species conglomerate consists of various coloured flower forms as well as different leaf types that are often so different from each other that it seems hard to reconcile them all as a single species when so many Galanthus as an example look so similar and yet are given species status. Be that as it may
Stephen Ryan
Dendriopoterium menendezii
This mouthful of a name belongs to a very hardy evergreen shrub from the Canary Islands that grows to a couple of metres tall and wide. It has an open framework of branches with coppery bark and it produces spikes of tiny pink flowers with green sepals in spring. It is however for its attractive
Stephen Ryan
Mahonia gracilipes
This is definitely the exception to the rule when it comes to this Genus. It is summer flowering instead of autumn winter as with most others, and isn’t yellow! An extremely slow growing evergreen shrub from China that was described in 1887 but only got to Australia via me in 1998 or there about. This
Stephen Ryan
Osmanthus heterophyllus ‘Aureomarginatus’
As the national collection holder of the Genus Osmanthus I thought it about time to feature at least one and the one I’ve chosen is the above as I have a half good picture of it. It is a hardy evergreen shrub to about 2metres with handsome gold variegated holly like leaves that would be
Stephen Ryan
Euonymus fortunei ‘Colorata’
This has to be one of the most indestructible plants I grow so could be something everyone should plant except it would then be as common as muck which it is in Europe and America! It can be grown as a lax shrubby ground cover , trailed over a large bank or espaliered along a
Stephen Ryan