groundcover plants

Asarum hypogynum in flower

Is Ginger Cold?

Starting off the new year is our flowering clump of the Taiwanese endemic wild ginger, Asarum hypogynum. The huge, glossy, evergreen patterned foliage is enough reason to grow this gem, but through most of the winter, the incredible floral display silently sits virtually unnoticed by most human visitors. JLBG currently houses one of the largest

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Falling for Spikemoss

We were recently admiring the lovely russet fall coloration of a mat of Selaginella uncinata. This lovely woodland groundcover from Central China and south into Vietnam, has a lovely metallic blue hue during the growing season, but we also like this change to the semi-evergreen foliage in fall. This is such a great, well-behaved garden

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That Won’t Grow Here

We love it when people tell us that certain plants won’t grow in our climate. As gardening contrarians, we thrive on proving gardening experts wrong. Below is a great example–our combination of Globularia repens (Spain, Italy) and Acantholimon halophilum (Central Turkey) thriving in the dryland crevice garden. Both have sailed through out rainy, humid, hot

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Siberian Summer

Looking great in the garden despite our high temperatures is the Siberian native, Microbiota decussata. While the species typically struggles in our climate, the cultivar ‘Prides’ has been outstanding. Microbiota is essentially a groundcover juniper replacement for shade. For us, it matures with a 4′ wide spread, after 10 years. We have found that it

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Ramble On — A Native Groundcover with Year-round Interest and a Pollinator Smorgasbord

Over a decade ago I decided to try planting the native Frogfruit (Phyla nodiflora) in the maritime grassland exhibit at the South Carolina Botanical Garden. To my amazement, this species that I knew of from the fringes of saltmarsh in the Lowcountry thrived in both wet and dry soils of the upper Piedmont of South

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Good Enough to Eat – Persian Chocolate

The lovely Lysimachia ‘Persian Chocolate’ is looking scrumptious in the garden this week. This amazing 2004 Darrell Probst introduction is 20 years old this year. Here is one of our original patches, still thriving. We have found slightly moist soils and part sun produce the best specimens. It also makes a great hanging basket/container specimen.

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