While I focus highly on straight species plants, I keep this area of the garden with a focus on pretty mutant varieties. Every year I change up the selection a little, seeing what gets bee and butterfly attention and what is truly just for human eyes to enjoy. I've got a variety of hybrid tickseed, rudbeckia hirta varieties (many of which are quite appreciated by solitary bees), powwow white coneflower (which butterflies love) and a green twister coneflower, too (it turns pink with age, and then attracts as many bees as the straight species.) A zagreb tickseed seems no less useful to pollinators than its wild parent species, and is always buzzing with activity. There are a couple "Queen Victoria" cardinal flowers next to some wild type. Though not blooming yet, in the past I've found hummingbirds don't visit these much. But I like the variety of colors, and grow some stuff just for appearance in this area. There are also hostas, petunias, and a caladium here.
Some straight species feature here too; some butterflyweed, blue flag iris, elderberry, blue vervain, switchgrass, purple coneflower, Rdubeckia fulgida, and Joe Pye.
by LobeliaTheCardinalis
2 Comments
wow absolutely fantastic. dare i say lovely, and i hardly ever use that word
Plant breeding is cool