Further ‘Beastly’ Stirrings……

Anemonella thalictroides ‘Cameo’ [this photo has been magnified nth times as the flowers are usually as small as the nail on your pinky finger!] has been somewhat fleeting in my garden – due to my own reckless gardening! This past year I had two frail stems, but, later in the season, after I’d planted my new selections from Lost Horizons, I had a difficult time locating it again…… time to add more! Luckily my friends at Fraser’s Thimble Farms are offering it in their catalogue! 

Disporum flavens is a member of another of my most favourite genera. Also known as ‘Fairy Bells,’ this delightful, robust selection features wonderfully veined foliage and pendulous, drooping bright yellow flowers.

Disporum brachystemon with its wonderful smoky rose-purple pendulous flowers has been on the radar since I first laid eyes upon it in one of the stock beds at Lost Horizons. I must check next season to see if they have any divisions available. If recollection serves me, it is very slow to increase! 

Disporum cantoniense ‘Himalayan Green Giant’ rounds out the members of this fascinating genera that constitute an integral part of my wishlist. I already grow D.c ‘Night Heron’, but in truth, not as successfully as I would like. I am most enamored of the purplish bruising to the foliage.

 A dear gardening friend, J, brought this divine beauty, Cardamine enneaphylla to my attention. Look at the amazing divided, toothed foliage, and those delightful whipped buttery yellow flowers……. come to me my precious!

Gentina sino-ornata ‘Kingfisher’ really needs no prefacing as to why it appears on this year’s wishlist. Ok…. let me indulge. It was last year that I was able to acquire the much coveted Gentiana scabra ‘True Blue’ with its robust, upright growth habit, not to mention two inch pleated cobalt blooms that literally smothered the plant. When I spotted this delightful species with the same smashing true gentian blue flowers, floating atop needle-like pinnate foliage, what could I do but succumb….

 and then there was Gentiana sino-ornata ‘Strathmore’ with lighter blue flowers distinctively showing a smattering of white veining within each flower. Sweet Jesus, another addiction takes hold!

Another must have for the woodland garden is the genus Hepatica. While I would love to be able to indulge in the double flowering species [$$$ ca-ching!] I have fallen in love with Hepatica transsilvanica, with its mauve-powdery blue flowers that appear in late Spring.