November Blooms

Posted on November 15, 2020 by Tina

Here in Austin, Texas, zone 8b, my late season garden is more about foliage and seed heads than petals and pistils. That’s especially true this year as we’re in a moderate to severe drought–we could use some rain! Even so, I’m fortunate to enjoy a few things in their last (?) blooms of the year.

This Mexican honeysuckle, Justicia spicigera, flowers-up as it feels like it: in spring, summer, autumn, and winter, this is a plant with a mind of its own! As long as we don’t have a hard freeze, this hardy shrub is truly a perennial bloomer.

The flowers appear, bloom for a time, followed by a rest period, and the cycle repeats. When bloom time is nigh–regardless of season–I eagerly await the cheerful orange blooms nestled in lush foliage. Especially now, with limited flowering plants, I’m glad that honeybees have these blooms available.

This particular Mexican honeysuckle bush is large and growing at one part of its base peeks out Purple heart, Tradescantia pallida. The tangled green, orange, and purple medley is nice.

In another spot of my garden, the Purple heart showcases charming three-petaled pink flowers. No bees here, but these dainties are popular with the bee and small butterfly crowd.

Rock rose, Pavonia lasiopetala, is past its blooming time, though three individual flowers remain in my garden, defying expectations,

…and providing for pollinators, like this Sleepy Orange, Abaeis nicippe, more hungry than sleepy, I think. It enjoyed a yummy nectar breakfast.

The small, year-old patch of Blue mistflower, Conoclinium coelestinum, growing at my garden’s edge has performed well this year. Without missing a beat in spread and bloom, it ignored heat from the Texas sun, aided by the human-made cement driveway and asphalt street which borders the plant. Blue mistflower is a tough and lovely groundcover.

This nymph Assasin bug, Zelus longipes, patiently waited for its meal. I imagine the hungry nymph moved in for the sip after I was out of the picture.

A consistently late-blooming perennial, Forsythia sage, Salvia madrensis, brings sunshine to a shady garden.

Each August, as the stalks of the lanky plant grow ever upwards, I promise myself that I’ll prune those tall things to half their size, ensuring that the blooms–when they come in late September–don’t weight down the stalks and branches. Some years I’m better about completing this chore, some years, I forget or succumb to August’s heat. Well, this year I didn’t prune by half, indolence as my main excuse, August’s heat as my backup excuse. Forsythia sage blooms beautifully, but the flower load is too much for floppy the stalks and they’re now lying near to the ground, draped dramatically on and over one another and other perennials. Nevertheless, the flowers are available for a nectar buffet, though photography is a bit trickier. Next year, I promise to keep this wayward thing in check.

Right. We’ll see about that!

There’s always something interesting in the garden and that’s something to cheer about. Today, we celebrate blooms with Carol at May Dreams Gardens. Pop on over and enjoy blooms from many lovely places.

A Tale of Two Mistflowers

Posted on October 29, 2020 by Tina

October is the month for mistflowers in my garden. I grow three different ones, two of them closely related. My original mistflower is the Blue mistflower, Conoclinium coelestinum.

My first experience with this plant was a four-inch pot, purchase 20-ish years ago. It spread with joy and bloomed gorgeously many an October, until deep shade forced its move to a different spot along this pathway. As this second area has become shadier, it’s time for another move. Soon, I’ll pull the strands up by their roots and transplant the lot to my SIL’s garden. That said, the Blue mistflower has grown and bloomed in this less than ideal situation, perhaps not like it should, but enough to satisfy.

Blue mistflower blooms are a rich purple-blue, its leaves slightly scalloped and triangular shaped.

My other Conoclinium is Gregg’s mistflower, Conoclinium greggii, happily grows in one of my rare full sun spots. I planted this group from a one gallon pot a year ago and it has thrived.

The Gregg’s blooms boast a lighter shade of lavender-blue–more lavender than blue, I think. The foliage is bright green with a pinnate leaf structure. I admire the foliage and even when not blooming, this mistflower is an attractive groundcover.

The spent blooms turn to toasty puffs as they mature, or once a freeze ends the blooming.

Mistflower blooms are fuzzy and feathery.

The lighter Gregg’s,

…the darker Blue.

Mistflowers bloom primarily in autumn, but pop out a few flowers throughout spring and summer. These plants are groundcovers, drought tolerant (Gregg’s more than Blue) and dormant in winter. I prefer the Blue mistflower–the color is divine–but pollinators prefer the Gregg’s.

Unknown fly-type enjoying some of Gregg’s nectar.

Unknown wasp (I think it’s a wasp…) on Gregg’s flowers. Any ideas who this character is?

There are other “mistflower” plants, several in shrub form, but these two blue-hued mists are well-worth growing. Gregg’s mistflower grows in Texas, Arizona, and New Mexico. Blue mistflower enjoys a much wider range throughout the United States.

You won’t tell a sad tale with either of these mistflowers!

Blue Mistflower (Conoclinium coelestinum): A Seasonal Look

Posted on October 21, 2015 by Tina

The first mistflower plant I ever grew was the Blue Mistflower, Conoclinium coelestinum.

Like Gregg’s Mistflower which I profiled in the most recent A Seasonal Look, this stunning native ground cover is a good autumn perennial to showcase for Texas Native Plant Week. I always think of this mistflower as the blue-headed step-child, especially in comparison to the more commonly grown Gregg’s Mistflower. Blue Mistflower is not as well-known or popular–not one of the cool kid plants, or at least that’s true here in the Austin area. I’m amazed at how few gardeners know about this lovely Texas ground cover.

Just as tough and hardy as its more admired cousin, it’s also a real looker. Pollinator gardening notwithstanding, the Blue Mistflower is my personal favorite. The deep purple-blue flowers,

…in all their puffy pulchritude,

…make me swoon!

I don’t think photos capture the depth of its color. You’ll just have to plant this beauty and see for yourself.

Interestingly, Blue Mistflower has a much wider range of distribution than the Gregg’s Mistflower. I follow several Northern garden bloggers who’ve planted this pretty, though I think it’s probably an annual or tender perennial in some of those places that experience true winter. Its native range is Texas to Florida, but also northward into Illinois and New Jersey (plenty of winter there!) and is grown in other parts of the U.S. as well.

I purchased a four-inch pot of Blue Mistflower for about $1.50 (I don’t remember exactly how much I spent, but it was very little) some 20 years ago. Over time, it filled in a back corner of my garden and put on a reliably gorgeous late summer/fall flower show every year. Eventually, that spot became…something. I never quite figured out the problem, but one spring, only about 10 sprigs returned. So I popped them out of that spot and into a another which receives a tiny bit full sun, but primarily dappled light, throughout the year.

The Blue Mistflower patch has thrived. With an almost identical growth and seasonal pattern as the Gregg’s, the zenith of its blooming occurs during September, October and into November. It is at its peak now.

As the autumn days shorten and cool, the blooms fade from deep blue-purple,

…to soft beige.

After the first hard freeze, the seed heads are wheat-colored and fragile. Like the Gregg’s, I’ve never experienced the Blue Mistflower seeding out, but if you’re so inclined, it’s at this point of the year that the seeds can be sowed.

I tend to leave the winter dormant plant alone until I can’t stand it anymore, then cut it back to not-much-of-anything, except for a light covering of Shumard Oak leaves.

You’ll notice the soaker hose which runs through the middle part of the Blue Mistflower plant. That one hose is generally enough for summer watering, although by hot August and especially if there’s been no precipitation, I sometimes hand water the Blue Mistflower because one hose doesn’t deliver enough moisture to cover all the roots of the entire group. I don’t want the Blue Mistflower to sulk, bloom less, and then cause me to miss out on its gorgeous blooms. I’m not the least bit selfish as a gardener, am I?

With the warmth of spring, the plant returns rapidly. If you look closely at the bottom of the photo, you can see the newly emerged spring growth in March.

Once spring has sprung, the form of the ground cover is firmly established.

While not much of a re-seeder in my garden, Blue Mistflower spreads by the roots. I keep it in bounds by weeding up the edges and passing along sprigs to other gardeners. As with the Gregg’s, I plant smaller evergreens like Iris and Purple Coneflower at the perimeter edges and I also have some container plants placed to visually enforce a stopping point and to give some winter interest. If this Blue Mistflower were planted in full sun, I would have more options for evergreen and structural plants, but this gardener plays the plant cards she’s dealt.

In summer, the foliage is thick and lush.

More than the Gregg’s, which has a comparably controlled growth habit, the Blue Mistflower is a straggler, stems growing wonky and wild over the course of its growing season and that’s especially noticeable once its purple, puffy, floral hats appear.

If you’re a neat-freak gardener you might not like this plant, but I find it casually charming.

Adding to its rangy behavior, Blue Mistflower also puts out stems taller than any of the Gregg’s–upwards of two feet or so.

The leaves of the Blue are triangular-shaped and a darker green shade contrasting with the palmate form and light green foliage of the Gregg’s,

Over the course of summer the foliage continues to grow and the perennial maintains itself as an unexciting, but generally handsome green ground cover, tolerant of heat and summer dry, and sporting the occasional bloom here or there.

In August and in tandem with the Gregg’s Mistflower–the fun begins with fuzzy-wuzzy blooming!!

While Tina the Gardener finds the flowers more alluring than those of the Gregg’s Mistflower, the same cannot be said about most pollinators. The Blue is a good pollinator plant, but not an excellent one, like the Gregg’s.

Monarchs like it just fine.

Honeybees tend to agree.

This Southern Oak Hairstreak, Satyrium favonius favonius, isn’t complaining about Blue Mistflower, either.

But I’ve never witnessed quite the variety of pollinator activity on the Blue Mistflower as on the Gregg’s. If you only have room for one, I’d suggest the Gregg’s, because the pollinators need all the help we can give them and the Gregg’s Mistflower is a Boss Pollinator Plant.

There is a fast flying and hardly landing tiny moth or skipper that I see each fall, flitting around the base of the plant, but it’s been a tough one to capture. I finally snagged a decent photo of one who perched (briefly!) for the camera.

I’ve also seen this one on the Gregg’s too, but it seems to prefer the Blue. I’m glad the Blue Mistflower has a committed pollinating pal.

Even though it’s not quite the power-house pollinator plant that some others are, Blue Mistflower still warms my heart and will always be welcome in my Texas garden!

As a whole and as an addition to a native plants/wildlife garden, Blue Mistflower is a terrific choice for anyone gardening in its range, who seeks a water-wise, attractive, hardy native ground cover that thrives–in both bloom and foliage–in sun or part-shade.

In Spring.