The pinky red flower is Sedum Autumn Joy. The cabbage like leafed plants are Bergenia.
Sedums like Buddleia attract butterflies 🦋 to the garden.
They are also a sign to me that Winter is on it's way.
Sedums are one of these easiest perennials there are to propagate from cuttings. Just cut off a little branch and stick in a pot of sand or compost and I guarantee it will root within 3 to 4 weeks. It really is that easy.
The Bergenias also nicknamed Elephants Ears and Pig Squeak change their leaf colour through Autumn, Winter and Spring. The go pink to reddy purple. They also bring some out of season cheer with a pink flower.
That great English plants woman Gertrude Jekyll used to make borders in her planting layouts. Going slightly off topic. Her brother was a friend of Robert Louis Stevenson and he borrowed their family name for one of his most famous literary characters.
They are both old garden favourites of mine and prolong our summer that little bit longer. I think they grow and look better in big clumps or drifts rather than just individual plants.
I like to see the Butterflies hovering and feeding on the Sedum at this time of year. The Sedums seem to melt through Winter and eventually appear and grow next Spring
My beds aren't big enough for them, I don't think one on its own looks right, my begonias are still in full flower, they are good later summer blooms. I'm sorting pansies, violas and cyclamen to keep the colour outside.
ReplyDeleteHi Marlene. They look good in pots and attract the Butterflies. The discount supermarkets and garden centres have winter and spring flowering plants like pansies, heather's, violas, primroses and bulbs to create a bit of outside colour in winter. I like the way the Bergenias change the colour of their leaves. They originate in Russia and China and are pretty bomb proof against our inclement weather. I do divide mine and make more plants every year.
ReplyDeleteI don't have either of those on my garden but, like Marlene, I have several pots of violas outside to cheer up the winter. Last year they flowered their little hearts out continuously right through until the early summer!
ReplyDeleteI would give you some free Sedums and Bergenias if you lived near me JayCee. If you buy one Sedum and take cuttings you will soon have lots of them. They are the easiest perennial I know to propagate from cuttings. You can also divide them like the Daisies.
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