Purple Reigns

 

There is something innately sad about the September garden – or at least the September gardens here in New England. They’re glorious in June and July. They even hold their own in the first part of August.  But, by the end of the month, most everything is spent: the sweeps of perennials are over the hill with browned-out flowers. Everything looks like it has a layer of dust on it, even after a rain.

This morning, though, I went out to collect the newspapers and spotted something unlikely: a foot-high Scutellaria incana (aka downy skullcap) in full bloom. It apparently came up late from seed because its large, August-blooming brethren are sad skeletons picked over by birds and insects.

Then, looking a little further, I began to see other pods of color – and most of them were purple and blue-purple.  There is apparently an entire September sub-culture of perennials and shrubs that wait out the heat of summer and come to life with the cooler nights autumn brings.

I next noticed several stands of Conoclinium coelestinum, better known as either blue mist flower or perennial ageratum. I spent hours this summer pulling armloads of this hyper-aggressive perennial out of places it didn’t belong. I apparently didn’t get it all because there are several stands of it in the driveway perennial border. Now, though, it is topped a very attractive blue-purple flower head, and those flowers are attracting flying insects of every variety. The perennial ageratum will be given temporary residency papers until its blooms fade… then it gets pulled out.

In the Magnolia bed, the Vernonia (ironweed) is halfway into its purple flower. The cultivar, ‘Iron Butterfly’ has attracted migrating Monarchs for the past three seasons. There are now four established Vernonia clumps, so there’s no need to push or shove to get nectar.

The flowering raspberry (Rubus odoratus) never stopped flowering, but the blue-purple bloom clusters now seem to be larger, as though it knows that with the first frost, its leaves will drop like a quarterback being blitzed. I still hate that the plant puts up canes several feet from the mother plant, but those flower clusters make it easy to forgive its bad habits.

Geranium maculatum (common cranesbill geranium) also puts on a minor show in September. It is one of the first things to bloom in the spring; turning the ground into a purple carpet. By the end of May, though, it’s just a green ground cover in need of a haircut. For whatever reason, mine is offering a second, albeit minor, flowering.  I’ll take it.

There is also Callicarpa americana, with the common name of beautyberry.  I have mixed feelings about it during the growing season and especially in the spring, as it spreads aggressively by runners. There are now magnificent clusters of tiny purple berries along each of its stems. The first freeze will harden them off. Then, the birds will descend and pick them clean within a week or two.

Not to be forgotten is the Chelonia glabra, or pink turtlehead.  It begins growing in June and, by August, is a nicely proportioned, two-foot-high green bush. Then, seemingly overnight, come the covering of purple flowers and the butterflies that call the plant their host. The flowers are all too brief – less than two weeks. But the show is spectacular.

Finally, there is Lobelia siphilitica, or great blue lobelia. It comes out of nowhere in August, growing from the seeds sewn the previous fall. Until it blooms, it is an ugly duckling of a perennial; squat but also somehow gangly at the same time. But, when it (and its white-flowering sibling) blooms, it is the belle of the ball. Birds, alas, pick apart the flowers, but there is so many of them, the savaging is easily overlooked.

That’s the purple reign of September. You have to look for it but, once you see it, you can’t stop smiling.

See You in September

I walked out to get the newspapers this morning, got fifty feet down the driveway, and headed back into the house for a camera.

The conventional wisdom is that New England gardens are shadows of their summer glory by the beginning of September.  Annuals are overgrown and rangy and perennials are spent.  Trees and shrubs are saving themselves for an October burst of dying splendor.

The accompanying photos (double-click on any one of them to get a full-screen slideshow) demonstrate that the conventional wisdom sometimes gets it wrong.  Each of these shrubs and perennials are within fifteen feet of our driveway.  Some notes about each one: 

asters

Asters:  I’m not certain that we’ve ever actually purchased any asters.  Those that are in the garden – like the ones at left in the outer sidewalk bed – were transplants from elsewhere, but they’ll bloom from now until the first hard frost.  The trick to getting them to bloom like this is to cut them back hard in the last spring and early summer.  The other trick is to pull them out when they self-seed. 

autumn clematis

Autumn clematis: This is the only clematis on the property and one of a handful of perennials still around that were here when we purchased our home in 1999.  This grows up a shady corner of our library and our lone contribution to its success is to provide it with a trellis to reach a height where it can get adequate sunlight.

Caryopteris ‘Sunshine Blue’ is one of the three cultivars of that shrub that we have growing on the property.  From mid-April when it leafs out until the end of August, it is an unobtrusive part of the shrub bed at the front of our 

Caryopteris 'Sunshine Blue'

property. Then, overnight, pale blue flowers appear and the bees go bananas.  The blooms fade by the end of September but are worth the wait.

Daphne ‘Transatlantica’ has both dazzling clusters of long-duration white flowers and the added bonus of an intoxicating perfumed scent.  It will keep blooming right into winter.  The shrub’s lone shortcoming is that its evergreen leaves collect 

Daphne 'Transatlantica'

snow and so the branches are prone to tearing.  Each October we build it a burlap enclosure to keep its branches upright.  The pink phlox in the background is the fading remnant of an August bloomer.

Japanese anemones (Anemone hupehensis var. japonica) are more of a curse than a blessing.  We keep them in one spot only through a rigorous process of digging out their runners several times a year.  Yes, the flowers are lovely, but no other fall bloomer requires so much maintenance.

Japanese waxbells

Japanese waxbells (Kirengeshoma palmata) are a terrific plant to have around.  You see them here at their maximum height and vigor.  Once we get a hard frost, they’ll die back to their roots.  Why is this good?  Because it means I can dump six feet of snow on them from our driveway’s turnaround every winter and the plant doesn’t resent it a bit.  The beautiful yellow flowers are a September-only event. 

New York ironweed,
with hydrangeas below

New York ironweed (Veronica noveboiracensis) is, amazingly, a member of the daisy family.  We have two stands of it and, after seven or eight years, it is well established and sturdy.  The strong purple/lavender color is striking, and the bees cover it from dawn to dusk.  Some gardeners may be put off by its height (ours’ is nearly six feet) but you just don’t get color like this in autumn.  The photo at right also shows some of the late-blooming hydrangeas in our garden. 

Sedum 'Autumn Joy'

Sedum ‘Autumn Joy’ may be the most overused stonecrop in gardens today, but you can’t argue with success.  From early May to late August, it’s a terrific ‘filler’ in several of our beds; providing beautiful green-gray succulent stems and leaves.  Then, at the beginning of September (hereabouts), the flower head opens deep pink and stays that way for at least a month, then gradually turns a coppery color that provides structure even when the flower is spent.

Pink turtlehead

Pink turtlehead (chelone obliqua) is another garden standard that hides in plain sight until the end of August when, seemingly overnight, it is covered in blooms that persist through September.  Until last year, we had a companion white turtlehead (chelone glabra) that is a less aggressive grower and got crowded out of the shade bed where it was attracting the rare Baltimore checkerspot butterfly.

Joe Pye weed (eupatorium) comes in many varieties, and this variegated cultivar with

Variegated Joe Pye Weed

white flowers that graces our xeric garden (probably’ Jociuis Variety’) at the front of the property is a show stopper.  We also have eupatorium ‘Chocolate’.  They bloom profusely from September until well into October.

That’s a literal snapshot of the September bloomers.  I have omitted a few that have been blooming since midsummer such as agastache (also called the ‘giant hyssop’), rudbeckia, and various helianthius.  Among shrubs, we have a plethora of hydrangeas (notably the 'City Lights' series) that have been blooming since June and will keep up their show through most of the month.

What I hope I've shown is that September doesn’t have to be the intermission between summer blooms and the 'main attraction' autumn spectacle that attracts the leaf peekers.  If you garden in New England, take a look for these gems.