Winter Jewels
Happy new year everyone!
The bright lights of Christmas and New Year seem a distant memory. January is here and its cold and dark the days are short and night seems to last forever. The days are often cold and crisp with little heat from the winter sun.
Look out the window to your garden or maybe park when you’re out walking and see the bright lights of evergreen foliage shining right back at you. Many of our evergreen shrubs and even some trees, showing off their bright golds, silvers, greens and reds foliage’s. Some trees and shrubs produce brightly colored barks and stems.
The most precious of all these lights in our out outdoor spaces are winter flowering plants. There are quite a few plants around that flower in the wintertime. Often whether, they are deciduous or evergreen the flowers are often scented, and added bonus for our senses at this time of year,
Here are a few of the joys to be found at this time of year: –
Clematis cirrhosa, The winter flowering Clematis.
Clematis cirrhosa, one of the very few evergreen clematis. It has small dark green compound leaves. It will grow in full sun while its roots are in the shade and will grow to 3.5 meters up a trellis. The flowers are produce are large and five petaled bell like flowers. That have a light but pleasant scent. Of this group the most notable ones are Clematis cirrhosa Wisley cream, has gorgeous cream shaped bells, along with a variety called Jingle Bells, there is also Clematis cirrhosa Balerica that has light speckling of red dots on the inside of the bell-shaped flowers, the best is probably Clematis cirrhosa ‘’Freckles’’ that has a lot more red speckles inside the bells.
Daphne
Daphne bholua ‘Jacqueline Postii. A semi shrub that can grow up to 2 meters or more. They will grow in full sun to semi shade. The growth is often twiggy. It has mid green lanceolate leaves. In the winter it produces clusters of mauve star shaped flowers with yellow anthers and are sweetly scented. Also, in this group is ‘Gurkha’ with slightly darker mauve flowers and ‘Darjeeling’ with almost white flowers.
A lovely modern hybrid of Daphne odora, ‘Perfume Princess’ had clusters of large pale mauve flowers and giving a most pleasing scent.
A lovely long flowering small woody shrubs that provide colour in winter and well into our springs and the acidic loving heathers the Erica’s. Erica carnea and Erica darleyensis being the common with pink, dark pink or white flowers. These absolute treasures of the winter garden are shining beacons of colour. An interesting fact with these flowers is that they are good feeders of nectar for our pollinating insects in winter, especially as our bees in milder winters now stop hibernating. Once a bee has visited a flower, that flower will refuel with nectar overnight.
A type of hazel, ‘’witch hazel’’
Hamamelis, a lovely winter flowering shrub with a lovely scent with yellow, orange or red flowers. Can be a large shrub but can also be wall trained against a fence or house. This shrub also produces amazing autumn color also. Of the varieties available, Hamamelis ‘Arnold Promise’ yellow flowers, ‘Jelena’ orange flowers, ‘Diane Ruby Glow’ red flowers are some of the best. There are many hybrids of this group of shrubs.
One of my favorite winter flowering shrubs is the winter sweet – Chinonanthus praecox. This, can be large shrub produces the most sweetly spicey scented pale yellow flowers in winter. This plant can be the most boring shrub in leaf but when it flowers, Gosh is it worth the wait.
A tree
Winter flowering cherry – Prunus subhirtella,
A beautiful deciduous tree reaching 20 feet when mature. It produces lovely pink semi double flowers and will occur right throughout the winter period from November to march. The most common in this group is ‘Autumnalis’ with its lovely pale pink – white semi double flowers. With darker pink flowers Prunus subhirtella Rosea/Rubrum and then the beautiful arching stems of Prunus subhirtella Pendula.
A bulb,
Although you can get daffoldils and snowdrops flowering in winter, there not common. A sweet little bulb/corm is the Cyclamen Coum. This stunning little plant flowering from December – early March bring the joy of dark pink, pale pink and white Turkish cap shaped flowers with small kidney shaped leaves that are often dark green but pewter (silver) leaved versions available. These grow to just 3’’ and spread up to 8’’ with maturity. Growing in full sun or semi shade.
Of all the herbaceous plants that are of winter interest is the Iris unguicularis.
This rhizomatous evergreen plant needs full sun where it gets baked in summer in poor or low fertility soils. In winter we are rewarded with this beautiful blue with white and yellow falls that are 5 – 8 inches tall. They are sweetly scented if picked and brought into the house. The cutting of the leaves the half shows of the flowers. These will flower from January – end February.
Below is a gallery of pictures relating to January
