Ivy
A living wall full of wildlife
This evergreen big-leaved ivy covers the fence at the bottom of the garden giving us a green wall to look out on all year round. Birds nest in it, it’s teeming with wildlife and now berries are providing winter food. Even if I chop it back when it gets too heavy it comes again – although one time it took nearly two years to recover from a rather aggressive hack. I learned not to do that again.
Epimedium
Colour through the winter in a pot
This common epimedium is suddenly giving me red leaves. As evergreen ground cover this plant can’t be beaten. Here it’s in a pot and spreading all around.
Mahonia
Evergreen shiny foliage and scented flowers
This is a new variety of mahonia, Mahonia nitens “Cabaret”, which has orange flowers which later turn yellow. I’ve had it for a year now in a pot and here come the flowers. They should be scented too.
Japanese anemone
Roots that never give up
A root of a pale pink Japanese anemone which I had to go down 2ft to dig out and still I left some root in the ground. Toes for scale. These can be a monstrous thug and I need to keep on top of it as it smothers everything in its path. The named white varieties don’t seem to spread as badly.
Osmanthus
Fabulous scent right now from this evergreen shrub which fills the whole front garden with a lily-of-the-valley perfume. You may think it’s not the most exciting shrub but it has glossy evergreen foliage and scent from now to next year. Everyone coming down the path notices it. What could be more wonderful? Just plant one – you won’t be sorry.
Gorgeous scent from tiny white flowers
Scented leaves
Different scents from simple herbs
This is a group of very simple, ordinary easily available plants. There’s lemon verbena in the very front, purple basil on the right and pineapple sage on the left. The joy of them is that their foliage has a very strong smell which wafts through the air and even better, just brushing them with my hand gives me their perfume.
I’ve never had much luck with colourful bedding plants but these lovely herbs thrive in the shade of the apple tree and give such value. Do try them next year.
Thankyou to the propagator for hosting this theme of Six on a Saturday and over on his blog you can find the Sixes from other gardeners.
The colors of your Epimedium are very interesting, good idea to grow in pots. I also have ivy plants growing in my hedge. They have colonized along my berberis and the hedge now has berberis, ivy and holly. Which one will win …?
Yes Fred, not all my epimediums have gone red, just this one and maybe it’s because it is kept dry in a pot. I think it wants to spread and can’t and if I could I would take it out but it’s in the pot now like concrete and I would never get it out. Maybe it will spread along the ground.
The toes for size comparison cracked me up. Yes, the pink anemones spread, but I don’t mind digging them because they’re so lovely and graceful. I had no idea that epicedium could be so pretty.
Oh yes all epimediums are such great plants . Lovely evergreen leaves and then tiny dainty flowers sometimes in late winter or early spring. I’m never sure if and when to cut the leaves off – it’s a tricky thing.
I used to love Japanese windflowers and had images of sweeps of white in autumn. Little did I realise what thugs the plants were. Now I am trying to remove them from the garden with every tool at my disposal!
Oh Prue I don’t think we’ll ever get rid of them – I wish they had come with a warning, and the leaves are so coarse and ugly. Ggrrrrrrr. I will just pull up the seedlings whenever I see them, like I do with ground elder and couch grass. Oh well….
I used to have a Mahonia but it had to come out due to our renovation of the Old House. I loved it! Especially the way the leaves changed colour. Lovely.
Will you be getting another one? This new one is still quite tiny, only 18ins high at the moment.
I have on occasion coveted a pink anemone,and have often wished my white ones spread themselves around. But you have put me right off! I shall continue to admire from afar…
Oh yes, don’t invite them in if you haven’t got them. Their leaves thug their way over and through everything in their path. All my white ones are lovely, well behaved and have been flowering for weeks and weeks with hundreds of new buds to come. They are fantastic at this time of year. I’ll put them on my next blog. Highly recommended.
There’s lots of lovely colour in that photo of your ivy. The way you talk about the pink anemone, sounds like they’re vampires – don’t invite them in! I’ve lived w/them, tho, & agree w/you. I didn’t mind the foliage so much, but they shoved everything else out of the way.
Thanks for your lovely comment about the ivy. I will look at it with fresh eyes.
Oh yes, Japanese anemones are thugs alright. The more you dig them up the happier they are. But they are so pretty.
M.Caberet is such a pretty colour, mine doesn’t bloom very profusely though.