Horticulture Highlight-Verbena Bonariensis

I have really gone to town with Verbena in my garden this year. The mostly upright, slightly arching stems, finalised with clusters of tiny purple flowers blend so effortlessly into any perennial or shrub drifted border.

They just typically scream country style garden for me, I really so adore them. Their ability to naturalise in most environments, even quite dry- at RHS Hyde Hall they have a very exposed and dry site where Verbena is actually considered a weed, my inspiration for intergrating Verbena naturally amongst my perennials as a soft swaying backdrop, actually 'stems' from Hyde Hall, I just loved how they pop up through the perennials everywhere. I have quite a large drift through my main border at home and I can just see the iconic square stems and terminal flowers, swaying silently at the back of my fore planting. With their long show of flowers throughout summer and even through early autumn, attracting an array of wildlife, I do so fondly adore Verbena, and I can't wait for them to self seed freely amoungst my garden, it's exciting to wait and see where they will crop up next. 

Horticultural Highlight- Lantana Camara 'Feston Rose'

The autumn feeling is very much in the air and as much as I particularly enjoy this time of year, my little piece of summer is still glowingly flowering.

 

I was given this Lantana by a friend of mine and was handed to me very pot bound and not looking in the best of health. A month or so later down the line and she's showing every sign of happiness in these gorgeous little bicoloured flowers. Although frost tender, Lantana camara bear flowers from late spring to late autumn and providing interest the rest of the year with evergreen ovate leaves, what more could you want from a shrub? Come the end of October-beginning of November- she'll need protecting for winter ready for her to start her delicate display all over again in the spring. I absolutely adore this shrub, so much so I have pushed my luck and taken some semi-ripe cuttings now she's settled her roots. A fraction late perhaps but, like most things in horticulture only time will tell.