Here's another great plant for attracting bees - Biokovo cranesbill geranium!

Almost three years ago, I published a blog post extolling the virtues of perennial cranesbill geraniums as groundcovers.

At that time, I did a little kvetching about the fact that the cranesbill geraniums didn't seem to do a great job of attracting pollinators (which is always a high priority for me).

Well, I've added more cranesbills and they've expanded their territory and this year, for the first time, I noticed the 'Biokovo' variety of Geranium x cantabrigiense attracting a lot of bees - both bumblebees and honeybees!

The other cranesbills that I have - 'Rozanne' and a couple cultivars of Geranium sanguineum - don't seem as attractive to the bumbles or the honeybees, but they do seem to generate some interest from teeny-tiny pollinators (probably some sort of hoverfly or tiny wasp).

Anyway, there's no way that my camera is good enough to capture a video of the hoverflies, but I was able to shoot this short film of a bumblebee buzzing his way among 'Biokovo' flowers.

Enjoy!

PS - Over time, I've changed my mind on a lot of groundcovers (and other plants). but I still think cranesbill geraniums -- especially the 'Biokovo' cultivar -- make excellent groundcovers, at least in my Tennessee garden!

What a Creep!

Creeping raspberry not looking its best. Unfortunately, I've found this mass of dead stems to be a common sight in back-to-back Tennessee winters. Would the plant look prettier in a warmer climate? No doubt. But it would also probably expand faster, and that's a somewhat scary thought for a non-native species with few obvious wildlife benefits. I'd be especially wary of planting this next to any wild areas where it could expand and try to outcompete native vegetation. Oh and notice how despite its rampant growth, it has failed to block out all the love-in-a-mist seedlings poking through in the foreground.

I'm not talking about the iconic Radiohead song from the 1990s, but rather the creeping raspberry (Rubus rolfei, a.k.a. R. calycinoides or R. pentalobus).

I've reported on this plant twice before:

- In October 2013, I was over the moon with anticipation that I'd found the perfect groundcover. I waxed rhapsodic about its merits - the scalloped crinkly leaves, its supposed evergreen foliage, its rapid growth rate and its reported wildlife value (flowers for pollinators, berries for birds and mammals - including people).

- By April 2014, I was singing a different tune after the creeping raspberry died back to the ground in the winter of 2013-14 and took a long time to emerge in the spring. My dreams of a trouble-free evergreen groundcover disintegrated as I clipped back tough raspberry stems with dried dead leaves.


Now it's March 2015 and I've permanently broken up with creeping raspberry. After another colder-than-average winter (8th coldest February on record in Tennessee), creeping raspberry once again had lots of unsightly, dead stems.

After three growing season in the garden, the biggest plant had rooted all along its runners to establish a thick multi-layered patch that spilled out of a bed and onto a sidewalk. All the new plantlets grew so fast that they created maintenance work in the garden as I had to trim back the runners pretty frequently to prevent them from covering the sidewalk. (I'm pretty sure that left on its own, creeping raspberry would have crept right over the sidewalk and rooted into the grass on the other side.)

Creeping raspberry roots all along its nodes. These rooted sections send out their own runners, so the plant self-propagates and expands with ease. Too much ease for my comfort, especially when we're talking about a non-native plant with little obvious wildlife benefit and limited aesthetic appeal.

Those berries and flowers I'd hoped for to give the groundcover wildlife appeal (and provide a handful of fruit now and then for me)? Never saw them. (Well, I saw a single flower the first year I had the plant in the garden, but nothing ever bloomed after that. Perhaps creeping raspberry only blooms on old wood and thus can't flower or fruit in a climate where it keeps getting killed back to the ground?)

Creeping raspberry is a conundrum. Despite its wild and wandering ways, despite its multi-layered foliage, it still doesn't do that great a job of blocking weeds. In fact, I'd say it's least effective at blocking weeds than any of the other groundcovers I'm trialing in my garden (such as lamb's ear, perennial geraniums, creeping veronica, epimediums, ajuga or lady's mantle).

This is a Cambridge geranium (Geranium x cantabrigiense) called Biokovo. So far, I'd say it makes a much better groundcover than the creeping raspberry here in Tennessee. As you can see, it's stayed mostly evergreen through the winter with some nice reddish highlights in the foliage. Unlike the creeping raspberry that forms tough and wiry stems, I've never needed to cut back Biokovo. The last year's foliage slowly fades away and is superseded by fresh new foliage, plus Biokovo gives you weeks of white flowers with pink centers. The dense foliage does an excellent job of blocking weeds and the clump has expanded at a measured pace while staying dense in the center. 

So yesterday I decided it was time to give creeping raspberry the heave-ho. It did not go without a fight. That main clump which had only been in the garden for around three years had set some serious roots. In some ways, it was like trying to dig out a small shrub. To give you an idea, I had a much easier time digging out three (less-established) clumps of Amsonia hubrichtii (Arkansas blue star), no shrinking violet itself, than I did prying creeping raspberry out of the ground.

The trouble I had removing the plant convinced me that I'd made a very good decision to remove it when I did. Given another year or two, I fear this non-native groundcover would have insinuated itself throughout my planting bed, making it much harder to remove it without doing damage to some of the other perennials and shrubs nearby.

So what do I plan to put in its place? I have a couple of ideas. One possibility is Gaillardia x grandiflora (a hybrid between two North American species - G. aristata and G. pulchella - both of which are primarily native to the western United States, although G. pulchella's range does extend naturally into Southeastern coastal regions). Gaillardia x grandiflora has a reputation as being a short-lived perennial, especially on the sort of heavy clay soil that predominates on my property, but I have a few clumps that have fared very well on the other side of the driveway for a couple of years and I like the fact that it flowers profusely for many months during the growing season, attracting bumblebees and other pollinators. It's a very cheerful plant. Even the spent flower stems are attractive, so I leave them up through the winter and then cut the plant back to its basal foliage in early spring.

I may go with gaillardia as a replacement, but I do have a few other options I'm mulling over. Stay tuned!

Groundcover Review: Cranesbill Geraniums

Geranium Rozanne in early July

Cranesbill Geraniums


Pros:

- Very floriferous. Lotsa flowers (even in partial shade) + Long bloom season = Quite an impression

- Beautiful foliage

- Does not seem to be bothered by any pests or diseases

- Don't recall seeing hardy geraniums on many lists of drought-tolerant or heat-tolerant plants, but Rozanne survived the brutal heat and drought of 2012 (with supplemental water in full sun) and I have to think they'll be fairly tolerant of both drought and heat in a spot with afternoon shade.

Cons:

- Not a con necessarily, but just be aware that foliage may scorch in hot climates in full sun. At least that is what happened with Rozanne in 2011 and 2012. She's much happier now in partial shade as you can see from the blooms.

- Rozanne is herbaceous. That means the whole plant dies back in winter, which can leave quite a hole in the garden seeing as Rozanne is a sprawler. Not sure yet if my two other hardy geraniums - G. cantabrigiense 'Biokovo' and G. sanguineum 'New Hampshire' - will perform the same or if they'll be evergreen or semi-evergreen. I can say that so far both are much tighter in their growth habit.

- Can't see much in the way of pollinator action from bees, wasps or hoverflies. There are some little insects that buzz around the flowers, but they don't seem to land much. I think they may just be in the vicinity while visiting the Sweet Alyssum. Or maybe they visit at night when I'm not looking?

- Not native to the U.S.

Geranium sanguineum "New Hampshire" in early July

Conclusion:

- Rozanne was my first hardy geranium love and probably still the one I like best. I'd like them all a lot better if the bees seemed more interested. The herbaceous nature of Rozanne is a real drag and can be a challenge in figuring out garden design. I'll have to reserve final judgment on cantabrigiense and sanguineum until seeing how they perform this winter. I think all of these make nice low-growing perennials, but I'm not sure they really qualify as groundcovers. (Although other varieties I don't have in my garden yet, such as G. macrorrhizum are actually supposed to have more of a groundcover habit.)


UPDATE 4/17 - 'Rozanne' ended up being a lovely, but somewhat short-lived plant in my garden. Geranium x cantabrigiense 'Biokovo' has turned out to be one of my favorite perennials. Sure, it might be a bit happier with some more shade (mine are mostly planted where they get full sun all morning and into early afternoon), but it hangs tough during the summer and makes an excellent, beautiful evergreen groundcover especially in spring, summer and autumn. Sometimes 'Biokovo' flowers even attract bumblebees! BUT...I do wish to retract my recommendation on G. sanguineum. This plant has turned into a bit of a nightmare. I thought it was spreading too aggressively and overwhelming other nearby plants, so I decided to rip it out. Ha. Geranium sanguineum - or bloody cranesbill - has deep, thick, red roots. They hang on touch and snap easily (at least in heavy clay soil). And the plant regrows from even small root fragments. The upshot - I've dug up certain areas oh, half-a-dozen times trying to get rid of G. sanguineum and probably will be digging all this year trying to eradicate the last remnants. Meanwhile, I've got quite a few holes and blank spaces in my garden where I can't plant anything lest I need to excavate again in a search for G. sanguineum root pieces. Ugh. Don't plant it. (Unless you're in its native range - Europe, far western parts of Asia. In that case, I guess you could plant it if you wanted a really tough, aggressive native romping through your garden.)

All Summer Long -- The Flower Parade Continues into August

Zinnia elegans, just one of a wide variety of self-sown volunteer zinnias in my garden in a dazzling variety of colors and shapes. Gardening books suggest deadheading zinnias for more blooms, but I rarely deadhead mine (since the goldfinches like to eat the seeds) and I still tend to get blooms for months! Zinnias are heat-tolerant and somewhat drought-tolerant, in my experience.

The foliage on one of the aquilegia plants was looking very tired, so I cut it all the way back down to the ground. From my experience in prior years, fresh new foliage -- seen here -- will soon emerge and make the plant look good as new. 

One of the two Black Chokeberries (Aronia melanocarpa) that I planted in spring 2012. This one is doing great, has probably tripled in size so far this year and is still pushing new growth. It gets morning sun and afternoon shade.

This is the other Aronia melanocarpa, also doing pretty well. It's bushier with more suckers pushing up, but it has not grown as tall. And if you look closely, you'll notice light dots on many of the upper leaves. I believe those are injuries caused by lace bugs. I typically don't spray any of my plants and this is no exception (although I did wash off the undersides of some of the worst affected leaves with a garden hose). I want to see if the Aronia can fight off the lace bugs -- hopefully with the assistance of some beneficial insects drawn in by the pests themselves and flowers like Sweet Alyssum that I've planted nearby. From what I've read, lace bugs don't usually cause the plant any severe damage, so I'm hopefully the Aronia will survive this indignity and emerge even stronger next year. 

Yes, like every other homeowner south of the Mason-Dixon, I have several crape myrtles. My favorites are the ones with white flowers like Natchez. I tend to find most of the other colors a bit too jarring and garish in the landscape. Plus in my experience, the white-flowered ones seem to attract the most bees! Anyway, like several of the other crape cultivars, Natchez has gorgeous exfoliating bark. I love both the older grey bark that's sloughing off and the ultra-smooth glowing new brown bark underneath.
 

Close up on Natchez Crape Myrtle blossoms

Cucumber-leaf sunflower (grown from seed), blooming its heart out for weeks and weeks!

OK, it can't all be pretty. This is/was a Salvia nemorosa (either May Night or Blue Hill...I planted them next to each other and never could remember which was which). Both plants bloomed too early to attract many bees. I trimmed them back as suggested to stimulate a rebloom. Instead, I seem to have stimulated their early demise.

And...here's the other Salvia nemorosa. It's not totally dead yet. Just mostly dead.

Sunflower, taller than me (ergo taller than 6-feet)

Gaillardia pulchella "Arizona Apricot", attracts small bees, keeps blooming for months even without deadheading, even the spent flowerheads are attractive fuzzy balls. Technically perennial to zone 3, but it is not supposed to do well on heavy soils (like our clay), so I'm not counting on it to come back next year. But it is supposed to self sow, so hopefully I'll have some gaillardia regardless. And just in case, I'll probably try growing some from seed too. (This one was grown from a transplanted seedling purchased I believe at the Perennial Plant Society of Middle Tennessee plant sale.)

Not too many flowers here, but the foliage of this perennial geranium (x cantabrigiense "Biokovo") is looking great with barely any supplemental water all year in its first year in the ground.
 

Rozanne perennial geraniums are having their Best Year Ever. There are three Rozanne plants all mixed and rambling together. They too flower for weeks and weeks, especially when given afternoon shade. You can see that the plant is even pumping out fresh new (lighter green) foliage in August!

Yet another perennial geranium - Geranium sanguineum "New Hampshire". This one is throwing off a few flowers and lots of fresh green foliage. Beautiful!

Love the sky blue flowers on the Hardy Blue Plumbago (HBP). But why is it turning red so early in the year? That can't be a good sign... This one is in the sun and it's looking reddest (also doesn't seem to have grown at all from last year), but one of the two HBPs in partial shade is also reddening a bit. Hmmmm.... Has anyone else experienced this?

Lovely lemony flowers on the perennial sunflower Helianthus microcephalus (Small-headed Sunflower), "Lemon Queen" variety purchased just this spring at Gardens in the Wood of Grassy Creek. As with many of my other Gardens in the Wood purchases, this one has done great. This healthy, bushy plant is probably between 4-5 feet tall now. There are about a dozen flowers already open and many more buds. I'm guessing that within a week or two, this plant be covered with dozens of flowers. The bees and other beneficial insects are already happily visiting the flowers. I imagine the whole plant will be buzzing with activity very soon!

Don't be too grossed out, but what you're looking at here is a stem of the Lemon Queen perennial sunflower pictured above. You're probably wondering what the heck is that white foam at the stem junction? I was wondering too, so I looked it up and near as I can tell, it's probably the excretions of an insect called (for obvious reason) the Spittlebug or Froghopper. The insect sucks some sap from the plant and uses some of that sap to produce the foam to camouflage itself and protect it from predators. What do you think? Gross? Amazing? Clever? All of the above? Anyway, apparently spittlebugs usually don't hurt the plants on which they feed, so I've opted to pursue my usual policy of benign neglect, although I did use a hose to wash off some of the spittle one time to give predatory insects or birds a chance to do their thing.

Another sunflower? Not quite. This is a False Sunflower, Heliopsis helianthoides "Summer Sun" variety. Like many of the other flowers featured here, Heliopsis has been blooming for many weeks. Amazingly, the one slightly faded flower in the bottom left of the photo was the very first flower that opened and it's still looking pretty good! I haven't seen the Heliopsis attract as many bees or butterflies as the true sunflowers, but perhaps it's just getting overlooked right now? Although gardening guides say the plant can get up to 5-feet tall, it's probably only around 12-inches at the moment. It is a native perennial (hardy to zone 3), so perhaps it will get bigger next year? I think some Garden of Aaron readers have commented that Heliopsis self sows readily, so perhaps the bees will take more notice next year if I have a whole patch of Heliopsis plants for them to visit...

This is New York Ironweed (Vernonia noveboracensis). The foliage looks nice and I love the purple color of the flowers, but I have to admit I've been a little disappointed so far. The flowers are small, they don't seem to last that long, the spent flowers are not particularly attractive and worst of all, I don't think I've seen any bees or butterflies visiting the Ironweed yet. I've no intention of pulling the plant, but I am a little bummed that it has not attracted more pollinators yet. Again, as with the Heliopsis, maybe the problem is that I only planted a single Ironweed?

Similar issue here with the dwarf Joe-Pye Weed (Eupatorium dubium "Baby Joe"). I recently saw my first small bee on this plant, but I have not seen a single butterfly visit it yet, despite the fact that it is advertised as a butterfly magnet. I do have to admit that both the foliage and the pink flowerheads are very pretty though.

Another sunflower (Helianthus annus) bloom. I've got a lot of them in a variety of sizes and shapes. That's what happens when you plant a variety pack of sunflower seeds!

The older foliage on the Vitex agnus-castus is still looking great, but I'm excited to see the plant is having a flush of beautiful light green foliage. For some reason, I find these new leaves incredibly cute. I'm hoping the new leaves means that a second flush of flowers might be on the way. The bees - especially the bumble bees - went nuts over the earlier Vitex blooms, so I'm sure they'd appreciate a second round! 

Speaking of those earlier Vitex blooms, you can see the spent flowerheads here with their seeds forming. And camouflaged among the seeds is quite an interesting insect. Does anyone know what this? I imagine that it's predatory and is hiding among the seedheads waiting for an unsuspecting prey insect to alight?

Here's a mixed patch of Cosmos and Zinnias. As you can see, I love the casual and informal look of different colors all mixing cheerfully together.  

Let's finish up with the irrepressible purple coneflowers. Some of the petals are looking tattered, but these plants have been blooming for months, giving joy to countless bumblebees like the one on the right side of this photo. If you want to find a bumblee in my garden on a hot summer day, the best place to look would be on a sunflower or a coneflower.

I hope you enjoyed this little tour. I'll try to do another photo safari through the garden toward the end of September. Will the garden still be filled with flowers in another 6-8 weeks? Or will pathogens and pests get the upper hand? (Right after I took some of these photos, I noticed that powdery mildew is starting to run rampant through the zinnias.) 

Tune in next time - Same Bat Time, Same Bat Channel :)

June is Blooming Out All Over - Geraniums, Honeysuckle, Salvia, Zinnias, Monarda, Malva sylvestris, Crape Myrtle, Hypericum and more!

After a long cold winter and a wet cool spring, the summer heat has finally arrived in TN with temps in the low-to-middle 90s earlier this week.

(Of course, that was the day our air-conditioning decided to conk out. Figures.)

Anyway, here are some of the blooms on this month's hit parade:

Zinnias! These are self-sown Z. elegans from last year. Can't remember the cultivar name. They started blooming in early June.

Perennial Geranium "Biokovo", this is one of those plants that looks better in person than in a photograph. The flowers - washed out here - are actually a lovely pinkish-white. And the dead flowers in the photo (some of which are actually from the azalea behind the geranium) are not actually very noticeable in real life. It hasn't expanded much (which could be a pro or con depending on your viewpoint), but this plant is like the Energizer Bunny of geraniums - it keeps blooming and blooming and...

Rozanne Perennial Geranium, sprawling, billowy and floriferous!

North American native, non-invasive trumpet honeysuckle - Lonicera Sempervirens "Blanche Sandman". Has been blooming for months and recently has begun attracting a hummingbird sporadically.

Monarda didyma "Jacob Cline" flower close-up. Reportedly monarda is technically edible. We tried adding some young leaves to our salad and were reminded that "edible" does not necessarily mean "palatable". But pinching the top leaves did cause Monarda to branch out and double the number of flowerheads. Bonus!

Monarda didyma "Jacob Cline" whole plant. I did not contain this plant despite warnings that it could become invasive. I can see one small stem emerging near the base of the plant. I'll need to keep on eye on Jacob and will report back if he gets out of control.

Agastache "Golden Jubilee". Happy in partial sun. Typically agastache is supposed to like full sun, but my experience with variegated or yellow-leafed plants is that they generally need afternoon shade in TN. 

Salvia "May Night", deadheaded and giving a bit of rebloom

"Natchez" Crape Myrtle flowers started blooming around June 7th. I've been pleased to see bumble bees working the blooms.

Here's an "aerial" shot of one of the Natchez Crape Myrtles from an upstairs window. I just wanted to give a sense of the flowers scattered throughout the tree canopy.

Cosmos bipinnatus and happy bee. I'm sure some of the Cosmos popping up this year are self-sown and some are Early Sensation seeds from Southern Exposure that I sowed this spring. Not sure which are which. Anyway, you can never have too much Cosmos, can you? :)

Hypericum frondosum, Sunburst, St. John's Wort. Can't take credit for these as our landscaper installed them last autumn. But I can sure enjoy them! They just started blooming around June 10th. The bumble bees seem to love these flowers~!

Here's a wide shot of the hypericums massed in a landscape bed. I have to say that the flowers are more impressive up close right now, but perhaps the bushes will look more impressive from a distance if more flowers come into bloom simultaneously...

Stachys officinalis, Betony, Hummelo, just starting to come into bloom ~June 15th

Tagetes patula, French Marigold "Sparky Mix", these are self-sown flowers from last year. They look small now, but if last year is any indication, they'll bloom non-stop until frost without any deadheading and get pretty large and bushy by then.

The yellow flowers on Lady's Mantle (Alchemilla mollis) are tiny, but they do last a looooooooooong time. (I've heard Alchemilla can self sow rampantly. Haven't seen any seedlings yet, but I'm keeping an eye out for them. Then again, I've also heard the young leaves are edible, so I'm not too concerned about getting lots of volunteers.)

It looks kind of like a sprawling, not so floriferous hardy geranium, but this is actually a photo of Callirhoe bushii, a.k.a. Bush's Poppy Mallow. Reportedly it has only been found at about 50 sites in the wild. It is a North American native.

Here's a close-up on a Bush's Poppy Mallow flower.

Echinacea purpurea, Eastern Purple Coneflower, a native plant to Tennessee. These purple coneflowers have been looking taller and stronger than ever this year. I've heard that you can propagate the plant by burying the seedheads in the autumn. I plan on trying that, because I'd love to have more coneflowers in my yard. In past years, they have attracted bees and butterflies, but I haven't seen either creature on the coneflowers yet this year. Maybe as more of the flowers open, it will get their attention?

This is Gardenia jasminoides "Jubilation". It wasn't looking good 6 weeks ago and it isn't really looking much better now.

As you can see, I've been having problems with leaves turning yellow and brown, then dropping off. I don't know if this is lingering transplant shock (it was planted last August), unhappiness with the cold weather we had this spring. Despite claims of hardiness into zone 6, G. jasminoides is really meant for zone 8 and warmer, whereas we're on the cold side of zone 7. Typically, I don't try to push zones too much, but I couldn't resist trying to grow Gardenia after getting a snoot full of the Gardenia perfume on a Nashville garden tour last year. 

So imagine my joy when I saw this gardenia flower unfurling on June 13th! I bent down and inhaled deeply. Yes, it was a Proustian moment. Ou sont les neiges de l'antan and all that. A trip down a sweet-smelling memory lane. And if my gardenia doesn't pull through, at least I can say I smelled it once upon a time in my own garden.

Stachys byzantina, Lamb's Ear, "Helene von Stein". OK, there are clearly no flowers in this photo, but then "Helene von Stein" rarely flowers. It's the soft, fuzzy, silvery leaves that are the star of the show. So far, Helene has been holding up well to torrential downpours and more recently temps in the 90s with high humidity. She's supposed to be the toughest of the Lamb's Ears.

Love-in-a-Mist has mostly completed its bloom, but the seed pods are prominent and highly ornamental. In some ways, it reminds me of a collection of miniature striped beach balls!

Of course, there are still a few of the starry blue Love-in-a-Mist flowers blooming among all those seedpods...

This is Malva sylvestris "Zebrina". It is a relative to the Hollyhocks. I bought two of them at the Perennial Plant Society of Middle Tennessee plant sale. Both of them - especially this one - got chomped by something. I suspect rabbits, but it could be deer. Despite being nearly decapitated, Zebrina has still bloomed! Impressive!! Beautiful flowers, although smaller than they appear in the nursery catalogs. I'd say these flower heads are about the size of a quarter perhaps. Maybe if the plant survives and grows bigger then it will have larger flowers next year? Zebrina is supposed to self-sow vigorously. We'll see if it survives to the point where it can make seeds. If the rabbits were smart, they'd let it go to seed so that they could have many more plants to chow down on next year, but I'm not sure that rabbits are into advance planning.

Do mushrooms bloom? Because if so, these are blooming among some perennial - Rudbeckia? Tennessee Coneflower? - that I planted last year and that I thought had died out. Apparently it wasn't as dead as it looked. I've no idea what type of mushrooms these are and since many mushrooms are extremely toxic to people, I gave them a wide berth.

Again, not technically in bloom, but I find the reddish-purple seedpods on Penstemon digitalis "Husker's Red" quite ornamental. This is another perennial with a reputation for reseeding vigorously.  

It's a little hard to make out with all the variegation on this Ajuga, but there's a pale blue flower spike in the middle of this photo. The main bloom was in the spring, but it's nice to see a little rebloom in June!

Veronica spicata "Giles van Hees" has been blooming pretty much non-stop since April when I planted it. I've only deadheaded it once by cutting off a couple of spent flower spikes. I may try deadheading it again soon.