Evergreen foliage and berries are now popular for home decor for a primary reason. Not many winter flowers are blooming and available for cutting and bringing in.
Most flowers prefer to bloom while more pollinators are more active. Not many pollinators are out and about while weather is cool through winter. Consequently, winter flowers may be scarce.
However, they are not actually as scarce as they seem to be. Some winter flowers bloom without drawing attention to themselves. They do not need to if they rely on wind for their pollination.
Colorful flowers are colorful only to attract pollinators. For example, redwood is blooming quite privately about now. It produces no prominently colorful flowers to see.
Some winter flowers do not actually intend to bloom in winter. They are merely confused by the local climates. For example, African daisy blooms whenever the weather is warm. It does not know to stop blooming for winter here because the weather is not overly cold.
Cala are tropicals, so have no concept of winter. They should not bloom, but might try to.
Camellias are some of the most familiar and popular winter flowers. Sasanqua camellias bloom before common camellias. Different cultivars of each type bloom at different times. The latest sasanqua camellias might actually bloom after the earliest common camellias.
Sasanqua camellias bloom more abundantly. Common camellias provide larger flowers.
Although most salvia bloom during warmer weather, a few bloom sporadically for winter.
Autumn sage seems to never be completely without bloom. Meanwhile, cultivars of witch hazel bloom curiously on bare stems. So does winter jasmine, but only in yellow.
Oregon grape can bloom impressively within cooler climates. It is evergreen and blooms yellow.
Many of the better winter flowers are cool season annuals, which are no good for cutting. These comprise pansy, viola, cyclamen, dianthus, snapdragon, nemesia and primroses.
Stock is exceptional, because it can be cut and brought inside and is splendidly fragrant. Ornamental kale and ornamental cabbage are foliar plants that present like wide flowers.
Laurustinus
Winter bloom may or may not be an benefit of laurustinus, Viburnum tinus. Most grow as regularly shorn hedges that are unable to bloom much between shearing.
Those that do bloom often generate a floral fragrance that some find to be objectionable.
Nonetheless, with only timely pruning, laurustinus does bloom for winter. Many consider this an asset.
Flowers are small and white or blushed with pink. They huddle together in dense cymes, which are about two or three inches wide. Their dense evergreen foliage is forest green.
Individual leaves are paired, about two or three inches long, and half as wide. They have a very slightly raspy surface texture. Mature laurustinus can sucker from their basal roots.
If bloom is not a concern, laurustinus can be a dense shorn hedge, only several feet tall.
Otherwise, it can become a dense small tree more than 20 feet tall and 10 feet wide. Once established, it does not need much water and can actually survive with just rainfall.
It is not very discriminating about soil quality. Mites or mildew can become problematic in damp coastal climates, particularly among shaded or very congested specimens.
Comments are closed.