New Plants from High Country Gardens for 2012
Garden Tip from High Country Gardens
800-925-9387, highcounrtygardens.com
High Country Gardens specializes in drought-tolerant plants. The company’s chief horticulturist, David Salman, is a recognized expert in the field of waterwise western gardening and landscaping, and is a sought-after speaker on these subjects nationwide.
For spring 2012, High Country Gardens continues its tradition of introducing new perennial plants with selections that include three 2012 Green Thumb Award winners: Brakelights Red Yucca, ‘Fire Spinner’ ice plant (shown) and the Harvest Booster Perennial Collection.
Brakelights Red Yucca (Hesperaloe parviflora ‘Perpa’ PPAF) blooms all summer with attention-grabbing red flowers that are truly the color of brakelights. This new variety also is the longest blooming variety of Red Yucca, and its nectar-rich flowers look up at the sky and keep the hummingbirds coming into your yard all summer long. Brakelights is a semi-dwarf grower that is ideal for narrow and small locations that get plenty of sun and heat. Heat loving and cold tolerant, the plant thrives in hot, dry, full-sun conditions in well-drained soil.
‘Fire Spinner’ ice plant in full flower is the “wow” plant of 2012. This South African’s vibrant tri-colored flowers are an amazing late-spring spectacle and cover the tight evergreen mat of succulent foliage. A heat-loving groundcover, it grows best in full sun and well-drained sandy-loam soil (no rich, heavy loams or clay). ‘Fire Spinner’ is perfect for use in raised beds and in waterwise landscapes to plant into and cover gravel mulch. This groundcover is just 1-inch tall, but each plant spreads to about 15 to 18 inches wide.
The Harvest Booster Perennial Collection contains small and medium-sized flowering perennials that, when planted into and around vegetable gardens and potted vegetables, attract bees to pollinate the vegetable plants. The collection includes two plants each of Monarda didyma ‘Pink Lace’ PPAF, Nepeta faassenii ‘Select Blue’, Agastache ‘Blue Fortune’, Echinacea purpurea, Solidago ‘Little
Lemon’ PP#17297 and Oregano ‘Rotkugel’.
Garden Tip from High Country Gardens
800-925-9387, highcountrygardens.com
