Flowering this week at JLBG is the little-known, but marvelous Liriope longipedicellata ‘Grape Fizz’, thanks to the exploits of plantsman Darrell Probst. We find this tightly clumping species much more interesting than the more formal Liriope muscari or the weedy, spreading Liriope spicata, and will tolerate full sun to shade. By the way, pedicles are
Our 4.5 year old clump of Rosmarinus ‘Arp’ has become ridiculously large, as rosemary does. When we moved to our new home, Anita requested one near the kitchen door, which was a no-brainer since I am in love with both her and her rosemary chicken. Rosmarius ‘Arp’ has been one of the most winter hardy
Looking nice this week is this cool selection of the North American (Northern Mexico) native Manfreda undulata. All commercial forms of this are heavily spotted, but we really love this this amazingly rippled-leaf form that we picked up at Bob Brown’s wonderful UK nursery a few years ago on a UK plant roundup trip. We’ve
Looking good this week is Nierembergia ‘Starry Eyes’. We have special memories watching our friend Carl Schoenfeld collect cuttings of this on our 2002 botanizing trip to Argentina. While it’s only reliably winter hardy to Zone 8, it’s a flowering machine during the summer. Here it is growing in our new crevice planting near our
One of the plants we’ve grown and loved since the early days of JLBG is the amazing Lilium formosanum. We know without looking at a calendar that early/mid August has arrived, when the large fragrant flowers grace the garden, each perched atop 5-7′ tall stalks.
Here’s another oddity in the fabulous ginger genus, hedychium. First, Hedychium ellipticum requires shade, compared to most hedychiums that need sun to flower. Also, Hedychium ellipticum has pendant stalks, compared to the rigidly upright stalks of most more commonly grown ginger lilies. We love the elegant flower heads that adorn the garden in late July/early
Elliptical Ginger Lily Read More »
Here’s our reference stock blocks of zephyranthes (rain lilies). Within 3-4 days after a rain, the beds are ablaze with what the late rain lily breeder, Fadjar Marta, called a floral blitz. We concur.
When it rains, it pours…I mean, flowers Read More »
Just like the Broadway play, we love the plant, Boesenbergia hamiltonii. We acquired this gem from India in 2005 before it actually existed as a species. Back in the day, taxonomists who dealt only with dead, smashed plants, had created a rather large mess assigning the name Boesenbergia longiflora to every reasonably similar-looking ginger from
Hamilton…the flower Read More »
Flowering now in the garden is the little-known Hedychium deceptum, which translates to deceived ginger. Discovered in 1922 by UK plantsman HJ Elwes of galanthus fame, it was initially identified as Hedychium greenii, until taxonomists realized that it was not the same as that taxon, so to commerate their confusion/deception, they coined the name Hedychium
Raise your hand if you’ve grown macbridea in the garden. Raise your hand if you’ve even heard of macbridea. This cute North American native (NC, SC, GA) bog mint has really impressed us in the garden. Flowering started in the last few weeks, and shows no sign of abating. We’re always cautious with mint relatives,
