Tony Avent

Allium oxyphyllum

The Acid Onion

Looking lovely in the late July garden is the rare North American native Allium oxyphyllum. This little-known species hails from the shale barren (eroded, and often baking steep slopes of degraded shale) region of Virginia and West Virginia, where it is extremely rare, with a global G2 rank. The 1′ tall x 1′ wide clump

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Sunken Garden rock wall

Ready to Rock Out

During our recent Summer Open Nursery and Garden, I was able to spend a good bit of time with former JLBG staffer, Jeremy Schmidt, now of HortCo, to discuss our plans to rework an old rock wall in our Sunken Garden. With our plans now in place, we have already begun to relocate existing plants,

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Leucophyllum frutescens 'Silver Spirit'

Silver Spirit Texas Sage

Looking absolutely dazzling in early August is our plant of Leucophyllum frutescens ‘Silver Spirit’. For decades we tried to grow this Southwestern US (Utah, Arizona, and Texas) native, but failed over and over again with winter survival, until Patrick McMillan shared cuttings of his Uvalde, Texas collection. After five years in the ground, it’s still

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Mucuna cyclocarpa

A Honey of a Mucuna

It’s July, which means we’re enjoying the crazy flower clusters of Mucuna cyclocarpa. This vigorous, but non-invasive vine, from Southeastern China, flowers non-stop for us, from July until late September. The rubbery-feeling flowers resemble huge grape clusters. This self-sterile vine needs two clones to set viable seed, which is probably a good thing. Full sun,

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