Must-have plants

The nurseries are stocked and the mail order places still have stuff, so get ‘em while you can folks. In a few weeks, it will be too late.

First, I must bring up Persian shield (Strobilanthes dyerianus, shown above). This was admired and yearned-after by all who visited during Garden Walk last year, but of course by that time it was late July and we all know the horror of shopping for plants at that time of year. It’s “just” a foliage plant, but people who were able to walk right by this

were stopped in their tracks by the shield. Go figure. They still had some as of today at selectseed.com.

For shade—oh, it’s so difficult—but I have found the combination of elephant ear (Colocasia esculenta) and bright coleus to be very effective. Again, it’s all about the foliage. Green and black coleus is also very good with this particular ear. I don’t find these in local nurseries; they only seem to have the common type of elephant ear (green, big but boring) and maybe 4 types of coleus. I think if gardeners would be open to the idea of ordering annuals from good companies, they’d be able to add a lot more interest to their plantings. (Of course, other gardeners probably have better-designed gardens than I do, so they don’t have to rely on unique plants. And they have PONDS, and waterfalls, and big fat koi and all that shit.)



(Elephant ear (illustris) and Brilliant coleus.)