Don't forget the red ones!

Hoy wrote:

This  (Antennaria dioica) is a common plant in the subalpine zone and in the lowland woods and higher up in the mountains too. You get it in different colors between red and white. The red ones are showiest.

I really like Antennaria, after all, it's my namesake for my two email addresses. There are some very good species and forms, and yes, I too like the more colorful forms. One that I grow in troughs because it stays small enough, is Antennaria gaspensis (from the Gaspe peninsula, collected by George Newman), making a flat silvery ground cover, and while not showy it is interesting in flower, with blackish heads.  However, like many pussytoes (who doesn't like a plant with a cute common name like that) the flowering stems elongate and flop and entangle themselves, looking quite unkempt.  Which reminds me, time to go out with a sharp pair of snips and cut those ugly stems off before all the "fluff" starts shedding.

I had germination on one called Antennaria rosea ssp. pulvinata from NARGS seed this year, listed as cream, pink or rose, 4-17 cm.  Checking out the USDA data page on it, it has a huge array of synonym, with A. gaspensis included!  Recent taxonomic revisions have taken the approach of massive lumping.  It'll be interesting to see how it compares to A. gaspensis
http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=ANROP

Ooh, look at this one, Antennaria corymbosa,
Antennaria corymbosa E.E. Nelson - flat-top pussytoes
http://plants.usda.gov/java/largeImage?imageID=anco_003_ahp.jpg

So apparently, there is no longer a A. neglecta var. gaspensis, and A. gaspensis is A. rosea ssp. pulvinata, according to the USDA.

Personally, I like the bicolors best.

Antennaria rosea ssp. confinis

RickR wrote:

So apparently, there is no longer a A. neglecta var. gaspensis, and A. gaspensis is A. rosea ssp. pulvinata, according to the USDA.

Personally, I like the bicolors best.

Antennaria rosea ssp. confinis

Ooh, I like that one (A. rosea ssp. confinis), very nice :o.  So, regarding the "gaspensis" thing, if I get a nice pink-flowered plant out of the NARGS A. rosea ssp. pulvinata seed, instead of the black-and white flowered "A. gaspensis" that was collected in Gaspe, all it means is that the lumpers have done some heavy lumping.

Quote:

One that I grow in troughs because it stays small enough, is A. gaspensis (from the Gaspe peninsula, collected by George Newman), making a flat silvery ground cover, and while not showy it is interesting in flower, with blackish heads.

My geographical knowldge is dire so I had to look up the whereabouts of the Gaspe Peninsula in wikipedia!!
Perhaps others, especially non-North American readers might have the same curiosity so here is what it told me.....

"Gaspé Peninsula  is a peninsula constituting part of the south shore of the Saint Lawrence River, in Quebec, Canada. It extends into the Gulf of Saint Lawrence and is separated from New Brunswick by the baie des Chaleurs and the Restigouche River.Gaspesie is a touristic region of Quebec.

The interior is rugged, being a northward extension of the Appalachian Mountains. This range is called the Chic-Choc Mountains. A section of the International Appalachian Trail travels along the peninsula. Route 132 circles the peninsula, with one branch following the coast and the other cutting across the peninsula at Sainte-Flavie. Forillon National Park is found at the northeastern tip of the Gaspé."

The Gaspe Peninsula is very much like the Northern Peninsula of Newfoundland...many of the plants are indeed the same except we don't have A. rosea!  We have plenty of the brown Antennarias and a lovely one called Antennaria eucosma..the one in our BG is almost open.

In my garden red alpines are rare...here are two curently open.  Primula auricula 'Dale's Red' is truly red!  And I realize all of your Aquilegia canadensis bloomed weeks ago but mine are just starting.

Our Loiseleuria are blooming at the moment too....so Newfoundland is on par with the mountains of Scandanavia....yet our snow has been gone for 3 months....a testiment to just how cold this spring has been.

Thanks for the link!  Never saw this site..I now have it bookmarked.  Today actually hit 19.4 C..the warmest day so far this year...mind you it was pouring rain!

Such a heat wave, Todd! We have finally gotten into the 90's...and kinda enjoy it...

Kelaidis wrote:

Such a heat wave, Todd! We have finally gotten into the 90's...and kinda enjoy it...

Been there and done that in New England, a number of spring days to the mid 90's F already, with a boat-load of days in the mid 80s or more... our season as a result is so advanced, I'm sure its a record breaker.

Gentlemen, you'll forgive me I hope, if I am less than enthusiatic to hear of your high temperatures.... I believe we may have hit the dizzy heights of 65 fahrenheit here in Aberdeen, Norht East Scotland----for an hour or two on a couple of days in the last few weeks---- but for the most part we get pleased if we make 55 at this time..... :(

Lovely photos of the Loiseleuria.... sometimes called the Trailing Azalea....... I LOVE this plant.....we have it in Scotland, too and it is one of our prettiest little plants, I think.

M.

Hoy wrote:

Here's your weather forecast!
http://www.yr.no/place/United_Kingdom/Scotland/Aberdeen/hour_by_hour.html

Yes.... see what I mean.... not exactly cheering for June, is it??!!  ;D

I need to try a Castilleja...helps Lori that you live in the land of Indian paintbrushes!

Does Tropaeolum tricolor count? Not exactly in the Rock garden, but we do grow it outdoors and it's just started to flower - in the middle of winter.
cheers
fermi

In the garden of a friend of mine (Marsha Russell), she had scads of Anthyllis vulneraria coccinea; what an eyeful of blazing red color :o :o.  I'm not sure about the true name of this color form, I have seen it listed as rubra and coccinea, but these must be illegal latinized cultivar names, because even though there are scads of varieties of Anthyllis vulneraria, I don't find a var. or ssp. coccinea anywhere.  Marsha pulls out most of them each year, otherwise they'd probably take over the garden, but not to worry, they always come back from abundant self-sown seedlings.

IPNI.ORG search on Anthyllis vulneraria:
http://www.ipni.org/ipni/advPlantNameSearch.do;jsessionid=6864F48FB66FA0...

Fruit!  I can contribute with that...

Podophyllum hexandrum

How about a South African? Romulea sabulosa, can be grown in the ground here but I keep them in pots because of the cockatoos which have developed a taste for the corms!
cheers
fermi

Lori, Silene regia is a HOT ONE!  I wasn't familiar with this native, now my eyes have been opened... Hot Cha Cha cha!

Get ready for retina burn with Zauschneria garrettii (or Epilobium canum ssp. garrettii as now known).  This grows luxuriantly, two plants are now about 3-4' across each (and 12" height), the spread more than I anticipated for, thus swamping other plants.  But I will move it to a place where is can spread comfortably, as it is so worth growing for the late season burn of red-orange flowers.  Most years, it makes a "smattering" of those lovely red-orange trumpets, but this year, perhaps due to the long sizzling dry summer, it looks to be a banner year for bloom.

First, a photo showing its expanse of growth, just breaking into bloom among late summer blooming alliums.  Second photo shows a closeup with more flowers open.  I'll post again in a week or so, should be its most floriferous year yet.

Long ago, before I realized the diversity in Euonymus fall shows, I grew Euonymus nanus var. turkestanicus.  The rabbits kept eating them down so I never saw the capsules and seeds.  I just couldn't figure out what the allure of this plant was.  That is, until the year it actually did flowered and produced capsules and seeds.  Of course, I was immediately smitten, and I still grow the shrub.

Fortunately, I am far enough west so the members of this clan are not invasive (although I always keep a watchful eye), and I have since delved into the genus.  My favorite so far is the pink and red Valentine colors of E. hamiltonianus  var. sieboldianus (more so than turkestanicus).  However after ten years, the shrub is becoming more tree like, and I don't want to allow space for that.  The image below was taken in 2008. It is the second species with capsules to color up in the fall for me.   The warty stems and brown flowers of E. verrucosus are attractive, at least to me.  The pic is pretty terrible: the flower color is caramel with a hint of pink.  I obtained seed of Euonymus cornutus var. quinquecornutus this year, but I don't think anything emerged yet.  I save all my planted seed pots for at least two years, so I will see what happens.

Skulski wrote:

Not alpine, and not a flower... but the fleshy seeds of Euonymus nana var. turkestanica are red! 

Hello fellow Euonymus fans!  Just started to post, and Rick's message came in.  Rick, you show a couple new ones I didn't know about, but nice tempting ones they are!  I bought my plant originally as E. turkestanica nana, although based on what I'm finding on the web, it should perhaps be the other way around, often seen as E. nana 'Turkestanica'.  Checking out IPNI.ORG, I can't find any valid entry for Euonymus nana, nor E. turkestanica!  There is however a Euonymus nanus and a E. nanoides, although web searches indicate a Euonymus nanus turkestanica, so E. nanus is probably the correct species name.

My plant was grafted on top of a standard, as the type plant is supposed to be a low sprawling plant.  I saw this in a nursery two years in a row, finally succumbed and bought it for a ridiculous high price.  It lived several years in the garden, making a surprisingly good floral show (see photo), the flowers bright red rather than yellowish-green as so common in the genus, and then the familiar hanging pods, pink in this case, opening to red-orange seeds.  It succumbed I believe to to drought, but that is drought to the grafted understock, not necessarily to the type E. nanus.

The one that I'm really a fan of is Euonymus sachalinensis, a small tree.  I saw this at the Case Estates in Weston Massachusetts, a now defunct outpost of the Arnold Arboretum, where it was in espalier form, trained and pruned to best show off the amazing bounty of fleshy red pods and brilliant red-orange seeds.  It has gotten very late, but I promise to show E. sachalinensis, one of the very best and showiest of the bold-fruiting Euonymus species.

Who is our Botanical Latin "specialist" here?  As I understand, euonymus would be masculine, or possible neuter.  How can nana or turkestanica (both feminine adjectives) be in gender agreement?  My Stearn's book seems to be misplaced, not that I would necessarily get it, anyway.

E. sachalinensis does ring a bell in the back of my mind as one I have come across in literature, and worthy of ferreting out.  Mark, I though Euonymus spp. were no-nos in you neck of the woods?

RickR wrote:

E. sachalinensis does ring a bell in the back of my mind as one I have come across in literature, and worthy of ferreting out.  Mark, I though Euonymus spp. were no-nos in you neck of the woods?

The overly used burning bush, Euonymus alatus, is now considered an invasive species, and in 2009, added to the Massachusetts Prohibited Plant List (http://www.mass.gov/agr/farmproducts/proposed_prohibited_plant_list_v12-...).  There are many other Euonymus species that are potentially as gregariously spreading but they are not on the list, only because they are lesser known species.  I do in fact get lots of self-sown seedlings on E. sachalinensis.

Hoy wrote:

One more red, or nearly so. Anemone hupehensis has a kind of red flowers, especially if seen from behind.

Rick, the Euonymus verrucosus is very interesting. Does it set viable seed? Can I ask for some if possible?

All fall-blooming Anemones fried to a crisp this summer, so no flowers this year, hopefully the plants survive.  I don't grow the hybrids, but only A. tomemtosa, maybe to see it another year.

As to various Euonymus, not sure you caught my comment, but Euonymus alatus is banned and is one the State of Massachusetts Prohibited Plant List due to its invasive spreading by seed. I believe it is similarly banned from a number of US States.

The pic is of E. verrucosus in a pot.  I would have planted it out in the yard last fall or spring, but a rabbit ate it down to a nub last September.  It had two unripe capsules at the time. I am sure they were very yummy, as were the Styrax americanus seedlings grown from the disjunct population in Illinois.  Out of my hundreds of pots, those were the only two the rabbit ate. :-[  I guess I should be happy that was all he ate!

Anyway, both have rebounded nicely, and E. verrucosus will find itself in a landscape berm next year.  So I expect flowers (and seed) next year, and I'll keep you in mind, Trond.

RickR wrote:

Anyway, both have rebounded nicely, and Euonymus verrucosus will find itself in a landscape berm next year.  So I expect flowers (and seed) next year, and I'll keep you in mind, Trond.

Me too please.  Looks like I'll have a bumper crop on Euonymus sachalinensis, let me know if anybody wants some.

Hoy wrote:

E. sachalinensis is synonymous with E. planipes. It is a common garden shrub here although I don't grow it but E. europæus.

E. europæus selfsow a little and I have to remove seedlings every spring.

Trond, I missed commenting on Euonymus europaeus... that's quite a display of seed capsules.  In a way, it is better than E. sachalinensis in that it displays the fruit without leaves apparently, so more of an impact, whereas in E. sachalinensis the "fruits" can be partially obscured by the foliage.

Now, checking into the issue of E. sachalinensis being a synonym for E. planipes, I believe the situation is a little different.  Some sites suggest that plants in Horticulture are in reality E. planipes, and that the true E. sachalinensis is not in cultivation, or rarely so.... most plants actually being E. planipes. However, both planipes and sachalinensis are valid species.  The following site says that E. planipes has green flowers, whereas true sachalinensis has brown flowers, so it looks like I have E. planipes if this is true.
http://www.rogerstreesandshrubs.com/gallery/DisplayBlock~bid~9980~gid~~s...

This site says E. sachalinensis has green flowers, mentions E. planipes, but doesn't address the nomenclature or identification issue.
http://en.sl.life.ku.dk/faciliteter/arboretet/maanedensplante/2004/oktob...

And then some sites put it the other way around, E. sachalinensis (syn. E. planipes), and yet other sites say about E. planipes: possibly not distinct from E. sachalinensis?  So which is it?

===============================================
More googling, and one can read the species descriptions of E. sachalinensis and nanus in this Flora of China PDF on the genus Euonymus.  E. sachalinensis does have reddish to purple or brown flowers, so my plant can't be sachalinensis, and E. nanus has whitish-green flowers... so my plant that had red flowers was also misidentified.  In Flora of Japan, E. planipes is described as havingflowers that are white to pale green... my plant is most likely E. planipes.
http://flora.huh.harvard.edu/china/PDF/PDF11/Euonymus.pdf