Over the next 6 weeks or so, as we work our way, through the “Dark Months” of this Winter I intend to a series on Instagram of “Winter Flowering Plants” while working in my day job as a Landscape Designer working in Dublin. There are far more plants willing to flower off season, than one would expect, especially if you live near the Coastline where frosts tend to be less severe. This allows a combination of things to happen, firstly a number of seasonally late flowering plants, will often continue to flower merrily on until a strong frost put them in their place.
Secondly there are more plants than one would imagine that will flower “Off Season” in the Winter
Already I have posted on Instagram photo of a magnificent selection of Winter Flowering Heathers that I took last January 2020.
I planted them the previous year, in the Instagram photo I took in the depths of January 2020, they are producing a magnificent carpet of flowers. Amazingly they flower for up to 12 weeks to that standard until at least until late March. We lightly trimmed them in the Summer to maximise the carpet effect of Pink and White using, the varieties Kramer’s Red and White Perfection. Neither of which grow too tall meaning they are very manageable.
Second in the series is Coronilla Valentina an evergreen shrub which has no common name because in simple terms its not common. It’s Ideal for a sheltered, sunny site can grow to about 1 meter eventually and tends towards a rounded shape with blue-grey leaves and a magnificent amount of flowers of pale lemon-yellow tone. My Coronilla started flowering about 3 weeks ago and should continue until early April 2021 and occasionally again in late summer. The photo I posted on Instagram was taken last week.
There should be al least another 10 Winter Flowering Plants… featured over the next month on Instagram…see you There…