Cyrtomium falcatum ssp. littorale is a dwarf, cold hardy, rock garden-sized form of the common holly fern. Our oldest specimens of this evergreen gem, have topped out at 8″ tall x 15″ wide. While it grows fine in regular soil, it also thrives in rock crevices, where it tolerates several hours of full sun. It’s
A Festive Little Holly Fern Read More »
Despite a summer with a month of incessant rains, our patch of Acantholimoni halophilum continues to thrive. This native to very dry regions of Central Turkey should not have a chance in our hot, rainy summer climate. This shows how habitat creation can can often serve to mitigate the effects of weather on plants from
If Life gives you Climatic Lemons, try Acantholimon Read More »
Looking great throughout our rock garden sections is the elegant, evergreen desert fern, Cheilanthes eckloniana ‘Naude’s Neck’. Cheilanthes eckloniana is named after the 1800s Danish plant collector Christian Ecklon. We first met this gem on our 2005 expedition to South Africa. This is our 2013 Plant Delights/JLBG introduction, spore grown from plants along the road
African Desert Fern Read More »
One of our favorite desert/dryland ferns that grace our crevice garden is the Texas native, Pellaea ovata. The zig-zag rachis (the thing that holds the leaflets) gives it its common name of zig-zag fern. This dryland evergreen native from Central Texas south into Central America, makes a great specimen for a rock garden setting. For
We were recently visited by a well-known landscape designer, who specializes in Southeastern US native plants. As we walked through the crevice garden, and I pointed out a clump of Polygonella americana, he was shocked at how nice it looked. His comment was that American jointweed always looked scraggly in the wild, so he hadn’t
American Jointweed – Smoke this Over Read More »
Ablaze now in our well-drained, gravel-infused, dryland garden is the amazing Calylophus berlandieri ssp. pinifolius ‘Fugitive’. This Patrick’s McMillan superb collection of the US native (Missouri west to New Mexico) sundrop from Kimble County, Texas. The 1′ tall x 2.5′ wide patches are clothed with short and extremely narrow, fleshy green leaves, and topped with
Consider Housing a Fugitive in Your Garden Read More »
Looking lovely in the garden this week is the amazing native (Pennsylvania south to Georgia) Fraser’s sedge, Carex fraseriana. This sedge is so odd, that it spent much of its life, relagated to it’s own, lonely genus, Cymophyllus. We failed with this countless times, before we planted one in between rocks, which seems to have
I’m just back from speaking to a couple of North American Rock Garden Society Chapters in Massachusetts, an area I hadn’t visited in over two decades. My journey began at the Berkshire Botanic Gardens in Stockbridge, a venue I last spoke at in 1999. Over 50 folks showed up on a cold, drizzly day, as
Hanging with a Mass of Rockers Read More »
I became entranced with the South African succulent genus, Aloinopsis, years ago, after discovering that Colorado rock gardener Bill Adams had found many of them hardy there in Zone 5/6. We tried quite a few, but found that while they take our winter cold temperatures, they do not take winter moisture. Once we built our
How Low can Aloinopsis Go? Read More »
While the genus Oxalis has a few species that are known “bad actors”, it has many others that are amazing garden gems. One of our favorites has always been Oxalis palmifrons. Hailing from South Africa’s Southwest Cape Province, this gem forms texturally-fascinating, ground-hugging rosettes, that are right at home in the rock garden. We grow
Palm-leaf Wood Sorrel Read More »
