Green flowers

A friend once took me to task for my taste in plants: ‘Jim,” he said, “you only like the dingy brownish-green ones which are open for a half-hour in the middle of the night.”

That’s not quite true, but I do recognize a bit of myself in that appraisal. Big, colorful, flashy – those are not the qualities which get a plant into my garden. On the other hand, fragrance does, even if it’s coming from some inconspicuous little dowd. And subtle, unusual color combinations often catch my eye.

Here are two plants which appeal to me greatly. Iris tuberosa (also known as Hermodactylus tuberosus) is both unusual and beautiful, isn’t it? The flowers and the leaves suggest a reticulate iris, but it grows from a tuberous corm rather than from a true bulb. I had no success with this one until I turned it loose in one of the cold frames. Now it’s going to town.

The other image shows a real oddity. This is Ruscus hypoglossum. Some of you might know Ruscus aculeatus. In fact, millions of people have seen the foliage of R. aculeatus because it is dried, spray painted and sold as Christmas decoration. Alive, the plant is hard and repellent; dried it is dangerously spiny. Ruscus hypoglossum on the other hand superficially suggests what you might get if you crossed Ruscus aculeatus with the related Danaë racemosa. It’s a softer plant with broader “leaves”. “Leaves” in quotes because what look like leaves in these plants are actually green, flattened branches called cladodes or cladophylls.

In the garden these plants suggest little woody shrubs. In fact, they are monocots, close relatives of asparagus and thus part of the lily family in its broad, older sense.

Cold frame treasures

In addition to bulbs, the cold frame houses a variety of other plants. Most of these are not suited to life in the open garden, and each represents a significant extension of my horticultural horizons in a new direction.

For example, there is a young seedling of Sophora secundiflora. In a very sheltered place, this might be hardy in the open. Mature plants have fragrant flowers which suggest wisteria. It’s a very handsome plant and all but unknown in gardens in this area.

A seemingly thriving plant of Cistus psilosepalus has me hoping that I might soon see a rock rose actually blooming in this garden. I’ve tried others in the open air, and they quickly went from bad to worse. Various cistus have been described as hardy in this area, but it’s not simply a question of hardiness in the sense of cold tolerance. The climate here is all wrong for them. The little seedling I planted into the ground in the cold frame has slowly grown all winter: it looks like it’s ready to take off once the weather moderates. The cistus I really want are the ones with fragrant foliage; if the current experiment proves to be successful, I’ll try one of those.

Several of the asarums are temporarily in the protected cold frame. These are Asarum nobilissimum and A. maximum. Last summer they grew in a spot which got plenty of sunlight and it seemed to do them good. I doubt if their foliage will have a chance in the open air, so they went into the cold frame for the winter.

There are also several rosemary plants; these were rooted from grocery store material sold for culinary purposes. Rosemary is like cistus: it’s not really hardy here in my experience, although an occasional plant might survive for years. Again, it’s not simply a matter of cold: the climate in general here is wrong for it.

Another occupant of the protected cold frame is little Smilax pumila. An earlier trial of this species in the open air was somewhat successful. The plants grew and went on to bloom – but the developing seed was killed by winter cold. I’m hoping that they will be right at home in the protected frame.

Ceratostigma griffithii occupies a corner of the cold frame. I doubt if this plant needs cold frame protection, but at the time the frame was built the Ceratostigma was still in a pot and needed a home. Because it blooms so late in the year, the frame seemed to be a good choice. It has made itself right at home.

Ruscus hypoglossum is also spending the winter in the frame. I expect this to be hardy in the garden, but I have not yet decided where to put it.

There is also a little plant of Calluna vulgaris ‘Mrs. Ronald Gray’: this is there to remind me of my plan to grow a variety of little evergreen shrubs in a cold frame. Heaths, heathers and broadleaf evergreens have never become common in our gardens; I think the main reason for this is that they experience so much foliar damage that they emerge from the winter ugly. Cold frame protection should prevent that.