A splash of colour in the garden

by Elizabeth Shaheen
Now that the third season of spring annuals have joined in the repertoire, the garden is ablaze with fireworks of colour, explosions bursting on the garden stage in swathes of ever-deepening colour with the seasons.

Red is the colour of passion and the colour of life - blood-red - of energy and warmth - fiery-red - and of sinfulness (bringing to mind the fictional adulterous heroine Hester Prynne, with the scarlet letter ‘A’ celebrated on her bodice).

Some of the first season’s have already taken their bow and have left the stage, but many of these have self-sown to perform again with the third season’s.

These include amaranthus, sunflower, nicotania, dill and hollyhock.

The late-comers comprise many English wildflowers. One that returns each year is cow parsley, with wonderful umbels of milk-white flowers to 6cm in diameter. The fine ferny leaves are deeply divided and the plant’s stem reaches around 100cm tall.

The burnt orange, mahogany and sun-yellow daisy-like flowers of Rudbeckia “Rustic Dwarfs” add a warm glow to the fore of the borders.

Love-In-a-Mist (Nigella damascene “Persian Jewels”) bears a unique mix of mauve, lavender, purple, rose, white and blue flowers that sit jewel-like amongst the gorgeous ruff of ferny foliage.

Cups of silver smother Lavetera trimestris “Silver Cup”. This is one for the shade. Those I planted in full sun bloomed fleetingly and then said, “I’ve had enough”.

But those growing in the shade are as fresh and as full of bloom as can be. The hot pink blooms are washed over in silver. Lavetera, as it is commonly known, grows to a height of 60cm.

Sunflower “Teddy Bear” is just so darling one can’t help but to embrace its big fluffy heads. This plant is perfectly designed for the front of borders.

Put into your mind’s eye an entire ribbon of it trailing the front of a border, for it grows to a cuddly height of just 45cm. Truly enchanting.

Spinning almost out of control are the flying saucers of Ipomoea tricolour “Flying Saucers”. Exquisite white blooms painted over in mauve streaks dress this climber.

Stately and colourful spikes of purple-red flowers with green willow-like leaves are given by purple loosestrife (Lythrum salicaria).

Not only is it sumptuously good-looking it serves as an excellent gargle and wound cleaner and swiftly stops bleeding.

Coreopsis compositae gives off great-balls-of fire. Oodles of bright yellow, orange and deep-red sparks fountain over the more permanent plants complemented by the soft ferny leaves, presenting a height of 45cm.

A brilliant gift from the garden compost is a mouth-watering melon plant. It seeded itself absolutely in the most appropriate place next to the frangipani (Plumeria obtusa) where it is merrily climbing its branches.

I can’t wait for its fruit to ripen. There is nothing like free produce!

The Lisianthus, also known botanically as Eustoma, although strictly speaking is a perennial it more or less behaves as an annual and self-sows all over the garden, even between the patio slabs.

It offers its deep, upturned cups in shades of white, all the pinks and mauve through to purple and blue, which arrive atop stems of around 45cm.

This is really a charmer and an important plant for the cut flower trade. In the garden, it will bloom up until mid-November. What more could you ask of an annual!

Lady’s bedstraw (Galium verum) is a distinctive plant with perfectly regular small yolk-yellow flowers in small clusters at the terminals of branching stems and hirsute leaves.

Recent years have seen the rise of plants that would have once been overlooked such as Verbena bonariensis a plant I can’t wait each year for its ever-faithful return.

I cannot understand how this dreamlike plant was ever disregarded for it has a transparent quality that allows others to show through its wand-like stems and buttons of hot-mauve flowers.

Grasses are also plants with a lack of physical texture their transparent shimmering veils with sunshine streaming through them permits views to plantings afar.

The baubles of Scabiosa astropurpurea “Summer Sundae” catch the fancy of the ethereal butterflies. They are a delightful blend of gorgeous hot-pink tints with a whisper of white. Masses of pincushion heads sway in the day’s breeze.

“Foxy” the foxglove shows ice-white, spicy-mauve, warm pink and sulphur-yellow granny-hat-shaped spires of bloom filled with secrets, bringing with them loving memories of both my grandparents’ gardens.

Wild English thyme - its evocative whiff is one of the great joys of this third season of spring.

Superb for ground cover or growing in cracks in paving and in dry walls and of course it is of great medicinal and culinary importance.

Ribwort plantain is a plant that as a child would provide a weapon. We would simply twist the stem around itself, hold tight whilst sliding the knot up to its tuft of crammed flowers, and ‘ping’ it off - knocking one’s challenger to the ground.

The leaves of the common toadflax (Linaria vulgaris) are long and narrow and the curious bright yellow flowers are kissed rustic orange at their hearts.

In this miniature cornfield is the Corn cockle (Agrostemma gracilis) “Queen Mixed” giving a delicate haze of soft-pink lightly veined blooms.This is a perfect plant for waves of harmony through your borders cooling down the hot colours.

The planting scheme of the most intense hues of the warmest harmonizing colours hot pink snapdragons, fiery zinnia and vivid yellow escholzia are cooled down by the blue of salvia nemorosa and Salvia transsylvanica.

You can take, too, from healthy shoots, soft cuttings of many annuals, such as the double petunia, double nasturtiums, verbenas, bedding abutilons, ageratums, salvias and geraniums - which are treated as annuals here.

The flames of this third season of colour will wane into a shimmering cinder with richly tinted annual flower colour and the warm hues of ripening seed, as the garden turns into nature’s roasting Aga, orchestrating the treats for seasons yet to be.

I sincerely hope that my descriptions of the annuals throughout this season’s three- seasons-of-spring have given you some ideas for your list of wants for next spring’s casket of jewels.

Stroll through your garden with a sketchbook and pre-sketch your garden plantings for next spring. You can always find seeds on the web, just simply key in the seeds you want and you will find many suppliers.
Elizabeth Shaheen - GDN - 13 May, ‘07