Our 2+ year old clumps of Echinacea ‘Kismet Raspberry’ are truly stunning in the gardens this summer. The second image shows how we’ve used these as a color echo in the garden with a crape myrtle in the distance. Many of the new echinaceas are light years better than the early colored hybrids, which tended to be week growers and short-lived. Echinacea ‘Kismet Raspberry’ has impressed us so much that it will be available in the new Plant Delights catalog that will come out in a couple of weeks.
Echinacea ‘Big Kahuna’ has turned into a wonderful beast in the garden. Here is our clump of this super vigorous selection this week as it enters its third year in the gardens at JLBG with no sign of slowing down. The fragrance is also amazing, as are the number of bees it attracts.
Bees, birds, butterflies, bats and beetles are pollinators essential to sustain our ecosystem and food supply. Help preserve and celebrate the pollinators in your life.
With summer getting ready to begin, there are many plants that are at their peak and the pollinators are working tirelessly! Join our garden curator, Amanda Wilkins, this Saturday, June 22 from 10am-noon, for a personally guided tour of Juniper Level Botanic Garden. Take in the scents and vibrant colors of the late spring/early summer garden as the summer solstice begins. Register now!
We value the purple coneflower as a great summer-flowering perennial in the native plant garden as well as the mixed perennial border. Coneflowers attract both butterflies and hummingbirds. Purple coneflower species are easy to grow, heat- and drought-tolerant native perennials. Two things that echinacea plants do not like are heavy clay soils and poor winter drainage.
We hope you are as excited as we are about the new coneflower plants that greatly extend the range of colors and forms. Purple coneflowers are no long just purple; they are also pink, red, yellow, peach, copper, orange and there are single or double-flowered hybrids too. We continue to trial the spectrum of new echinacea selections, offering only the best echinacea plants for sale after verifying their garden performance.
The butterflies are feasting on the echinaceas in the garden. I just caught this Eastern tiger swallowtail sitting still this week. You can bring amazing pollinators into your garden by planting lots of nectar-producing plants.
The echinaceas have been incredible in the garden this spring and summer. Here are a few shots from JLBG last week. First is Echinacea ‘Julia’…a very compact orange-flowered coneflower with sturdy stems.
Echinacea ‘Salsa Red’ is one of the most floriferous coneflowers we grow…truly amazing!
Echinacea ‘Secret Glow’…love this color and flower form!