Best New Plants of 2012

Twenty twelve saw me move house presenting me with the chance to start again. Of course I didn't want to get rid of all of my plants as I had them in the first place because I liked them. But the new garden was full of tat that I really do dislike, and was also a lot larger.
However, I do have something of a love for the exotic so as a result tend to have rather too many as houseplants. After the move some of them struggled (including my Ceropegia sandersonii) and it became clear that they were not happy in their new home I gave them away. Naturally they were replaced with something else, so this short list will include some of those too.

10; Kalanchoe x houghtonii

Not a rarity, but it is such a willing plant and produced blooms for months on end.

Easy to care for, this plants has a strange characteristic - it produces baby plants (lots of them) on the leaves. These then drop off and root.

9; Cerinthe palestina

I was very kindly sent seed for this beauty by a forum acquaintance in Isreal. I'm not sure yet that it's as hardy as the common C.major, but it produces seed equally as freely so I'll be able to build a better picture as to its hardiness over the next year or two. The cream flowers are offset beautifully by the blue green foliage..................

8; Brugmansia sanguinea

A plant that I have long admired, I had in the past baulked at the price and the reported trickiness of getting it to bloom in the UK. I took the plunge this year and was not disappointed. Aided by one of the lousiest summers that I can remember it bloomed well. Not uber fragrant like the common Brugs, it is to my eyes the best looking!

7; Fuchsia procumbens

Grown from seed sent to me by another forum contact (this time in New Zealand) this small ground hugging Fuchsia is a simple gem!

6; Kohleria "Sunshine"

Another forum member kindly sent me some tubers for this rather stunning Gesneriad. Easy to grow and free flowering over the summer months, it is a perfect houseplant because over the winter you just allow it to go dormant and shove the pot somewhere out of the way.

5; Manfreda elongata

I bought this very much on a whim at a fantastic nursery called Cotswold Garden Flowers (for UK readers, this place must be visited at least once!). An Agave relative that is reportedly hardy down to zone7, it has taken -7°c already. There were plants there with multiple flower spikes but I selected mine as it had four side shoots (it now has seven). The sideshoots were important as I was (and still am) unsure as to whether it is monocarpic or not.

Total height of the flower stem was about five feet (sorry for the poor photo)..................

4; Passiflora alata

Whilst P.quadrangularis is my favourite Passion Flower, P.alata runs it close and in the UK climate a better bet. Sadly, 2012 was a poor summer and this struggled. I got four blooms for my efforts, but take comfort from the fact that it performed poorly at Oxfords Botanic Gardens too this year.

3; Tricyrtis ishiana

I am slowly building up a nice collection of Tricyrtis and was chuffed to bits to find this at Cotswold Garden Flowers. 

It needs shade and proved to be very happy under the weeping willow at the top of the garden..............

2; Bird of Paradise/Strelitzia reginae

This is not a new plant. In fact the seed germinated seven years ago. But in April this year it bloomed for the first time! So in my eyes it counts as a new plant!

It started off flowering indoors but continued to bloom well after it was moved outdoors too...............

Up close the colour combination is stunning!

1; Bomarea hirtella

Just Beautiful! Need I say more...............

So there they are - my favourite new plants from 2012.

Terrific Tricyrtis!

I have been starting to get a bit of a Tricyrtis collection going over the last couple of years. They're great for colour late in the season, yet despite their exotic appearance they are on the whole easy to care for and pretty hardy. They are particularly useful for spots in semi shade. Their main requirement is constantly moist soil.

T.formosana is totally indestructible and where it all started for me.............

It's one of the earlier Tricyrtis too bloom, and is a real doer.
There can be quite a lot of variation in the colour of different unnamed T.formosana...............

Next came T.hirta. Not as bombproof as it dislikes winter wet, but in a sheltered spot that gets plenty of winter sun it will thrive.

The next three all seem to need more sun to do well.
Things started getting serious as far as collecting them goes when I purchased the T.hirta cultivar Taiwan Adbane....................

Hardier than the pure species and taller growing it quickly forms a clump.

T.formosana "Harlequin" looks very similar given a quick glance, but look again and the differences are clear.........

T.hirta Lightning Strike...............

Taipei Silk is an early bloomer that seems happy in fairly heavy shade................

I've saved the best till last - Tricyrtis ishiiana..............

Its growth habit is very different to that of most Tricyrtis with the individual flowers emerging from the leaf axils and hanging from arching stems.............

Give it the conditions that it demands (constantly moist soil in full shade with good light) though and it will reward you well. Mine was very happy growing under a Weeping Willow..............

For anyone unfamiliar with Tricyrtis now is the time to share the rather unflattering common name - Toad Lily!

New Plants For The New Garden (part three)

When I moved house I was faced with the dilemma of which plants to lift and move with me. It's a difficult choice as we buy the plants that we like, but to lift everything would be unrealistic. There are some plants that also just plain dislike disturbance once established (I lifted my Digitalis lanata and parviflora plants knowing this and only succeeded in proving this to be correct) which also needs to be considered.

So after a fair bit of thought I decided to take the following from the beds;

Polygonatum hybridum.............

Uvularia grandiflora.....................

Both early bloomers, so as soon as the move was a done deal I lifted them. Not ideal as they were just starting into growth, but both flowered well in the end.

Blooming in late spring/early summer, Iris japonica...................

It's always a job to keep the slugs away from this, and this year was a particularly bad year in that respect - note the slug eaten bud in the top right.

Alstromera psittacina was a no brainer!

The lousy UK summer this year did Lobelia laxiflora no favours, but it's still one of my favourites...........

For Salvia "Black and Blue" I took a different approach and lifted a root section which I potted up................

Before long the new shoots started to emerge and by late summer I had this......................

My white Tradescantia blooms all summer so had to come...................

And there was no way that I was leaving my Tricyrtis collection! This is the common T.formosana..............

I decided to try something different this year and use one of my favourite houseplants in the main bed - Impatiens niamniamensis...............

It flourished! The beauty of this plant is that it is easily propagated by simply slicing it up and sticking in compost.

For parts one and two see here and here. 

Growing From Seed - A Passion

I've been going a little mad seed wise of late! I see something that I fancy, track the seeds down and then order three or four more packets from the range to make the postage worthwhile! It's a passion! It's not just a cheap way of getting your hands on a wide range of plants - it's as much to do with making your garden your own work. It's easy to buy a plant, but growing it from seed takes that bit more effort.

It's not as if I don't have enough seedlings to care for already. "Projects" on the go already include Anigozanthos manglesii and viridis, Bauhinia variegata, Iris chrysographs and best of all, Cubanola domingensis................

All the above came from Chiltern Seeds. One of the finest seed suppliers in the UK! An incredible range of interesting and/or rare plant seed, backed up by excellent service.

I also spent some time today pricking out tiny Tricyrtis lasiocarpa seedlings. Seed was sent to me from a forum acquaintance who I've lost contact with, so if you're reading this Pims get in touch!

Plant World Seeds is another excellent source of seed. Amongst the treasures I've had from them in the past is my Bomarea hirtella. From my most recent batch I have already sown the Lobelia bridgesii which are now germinating.
Lobelia are suitable for late sowing in my opinion, as what I'm after is good rootstock by the spring for planting out. If they get leggy it's of no concern - cut the lanky stems off and new shoots emerge. I've grown all my perennial Lobelia like this for years with great results. Today saw the L.excelsa and polyphylla seeds sown too - these will benefit from being outdoors during the first light frosts of the British autumn.They can then be bought indoors to a windowsill in one of my cooler rooms and should start germinating (that's the theory at least). L.bridgesii sown a couple of weeks ago are germinating already and will need pricking out sooner than I had expected.
But best of all, I now have seeds for L.gibberoa! It's a totally impractical proposition here in the UK growing as it does (rather huge and intolerant of frost) and as such will almost certainly never bloom for me, but I had to have a giant Lobelia.

Lobelia seeds tend to need to be fairly fresh. There are many plants whose seed become less viable with age rather quickly. So if you've ever failed  to germinate Bomarea, Lapageria, Rhodochiton or Tacca (to name but a few) do not feel to bad - the seed was probably too old (which is my standard excuse).

Seeds are a great way to swap plants too. Two of my favourite seed grown plants this year came from forum swaps.
Cerinthe palestina................

And Fuchsia procumbens....................

If you have interesting seed and fancy a swap, leave a comment.

New Plants For The New Garden (part two)

Part one was about the new plants that I grew from seed, so in part two I will feature the  plants that I purchased to help fill my new garden.

Arisaema are a fascinating genus and this year I added two more;
A.ringens.................

And A.tortuosum...................

Both need a sheltered spot with very free draining soil if they are to survive the winter.

I must admit that I knew nothing about Penstemon smallii when I bought it (there wasn't even a picture) so I just went by the nursery owners recommendation..........

He was right when he said that it was worth buying. I'm still unsure as to how hardy it is, but it has produced lots of what I now know to be viable seed.

Another plant that I bought on a whim was Ligularia przewalskii..............

Brugmansia sanguinea was certainly not bought on a whim as I had wanted one for a few years. I did however luck in on the young cutting in the last place that I would have thought of looking, and it was very cheap.

If ever there was a Brug that really likes a cool summer this is the one! The blooms are smaller than the more common forms, and certainly lack the heady fragrance, but this is the Brug for me!

I have a bit of a Tricyrtis collection, and bought two plants to add to it this year;
Taipei Silk................

And T.ishiana.....................

I was particularly pleased to see this one bloom as it is variously described as being tricky - I just gave it lots of shade and kept it moist.

Another impulsive purchase was Manfreda elongata, which rewarded me with flowers a few weeks later........

The flower spike grew to a height of 1.6 metres. I suspect that each fan is monocarpic (it dies after flowering), but the plant now has five new fans growing so I'm not overly concerned.

Bulbs are a good way of increasing the gardens stock and two new gems follow;
Gladiolus communis..............

 And Galtonia candicans................

This is a tremendous plant with some of them growing to two metres this year....................

Lastly, Belamcanda chinensis. It's a cracking Iris relative, and fairly hardy here in the UK...................