Winter Wonders

Hot plants for winter impact

You could be forgiven for thinking that there’s not very much that’s interesting to be found in the winter garden, but you’d be very wrong indeed.

Not only are there a host of spring flowering bulbs just waiting to push up through the soil to burst into flower as the weather improves, but there are some winter stalwarts that will flower whatever the weather.

Hellebores are a great example. The Christmas Rose (Helleborus niger) rarely flowers at Christmas and its white flowers are more often seen in flower during January and February. The Lenten rose (Helleborus x hybridus) is also often called the Orientalis hybrids, these flower from January and can be found in a wide range of attractive white, cream, pink, purple or sometimes even black flowers.

Winter flowers, especially those on shrubs are very often scented to attract the few insects on the wing at this time of year. Look out for the shrubby honeysuckle (Lonicera x purpusii) that bears strongly scented cream flowers. Another perfumed delight is Viburnum x bodnantense ‘Dawn’ that has soft pink clusters of fragrant flowers on bare stems.

Plant stems and bark can create a stunning display in winter. Look out for the coloured stems of different dogwoods (Cornus), these are a highlight in the winter garden and can look very dramatic when planted en masse. The classic red dogwood Cornus alba ‘Sibirica’. For the best effect in the garden choose a sunny site where the light will play on the winter stems. If the red stems are allowed to mature they will eventually lose their rich red colour. For the best red stems you need to hard prune the plants almost back to ground level in March. Cut them hard back to about 10cm (4inches) of stems above the ground.

 

 

 

Birches such as Betula utilis ‘Jacquemontii’ have stunning white stems that simply glow in the winter sunshine. Plant them in groups or as multi-stemmed feature plants for the best effect and don’t disregard other members of this useful tree family; many have amazing coloured bark. Look out for other stunning winter plants at local garden centres and nurseries. One of the best ways to get good ideas for winter gardens is to visit gardens that are open at this time of year and look at the plants that are flowering and looking good now. If it’s a local garden then it’s likely that these plants will also thrive in your garden.