Anemones are a tenacious set of spring flowers – and they have needed to be this year. They have a good strategy for surviving harsh spring weather by closing their flowers against the rain, sleet or frost, and hanging the flower heads.
Even the leaves, durable as they are, draw back into a tighter knot and wait out the harsh weather.
The plants adopt this defensive mode, at a moment’s notice, when a chilling shower is threatened, for instance, and the skies darken.
Durability
The name anemone is Greek for windflower, a name sometimes used as an alternative to anemone, and hinting at its durability.
This durability is a family trait: all kinds of anemones can quickly adapt to the weather, and they are durable in other ways too.
Anemones are mostly plants of woodland or scrub and they need to get ahead of the trees and shrubs that will later cast shade over them.
For this reason, they have tubers, or fleshy roots, which are used to power rapid growth in spring and also keep the tubers alive during the dry days under the summer canopy.
The foliage of the spring anemones withers away not long after flowering, just like spring bulbs. By mid-summer, only traces of the withered leaves remain.
Although tuberous, anemones are rarely considered among the spring-flowering bulbous plants, possibly because the spring anemone foliage is very divided and fern-like.
Native
The wild wood anemone, Anemone nemorosa, is a native flower that appears in old woodland in many parts of the country and is one of the prettiest wild flowers.
It is often found in the company of primroses and bluebells, also natives of old woodland.
Wild plants vary in flower size and flower numbers and, over the years, some of the bigger and better forms have been selected and grown in gardens.
Plants showing a touch of pink or lavender colour have been selected too and are offered as garden varieties. This is a great little plant for a shady corner under shrubs or trees, as long as it gets its touch of the spring sunlight to set its seeds.
Reliable
The Greek anemone, Anemone blanda, is widely grown in gardens for its blue flowers, open and daisy-like in shape. It is a very easy flower to grow and completely reliable.
It increases its clump by spreading slowly underground, as the wood anemone does too, but somewhat more quickly, because it is a more vigorous plant. It loves light shade and well-drained ground.
There are pink and white forms of this anemone too, but the blue ones in denim-blue shades look great with yellow daffodils or other spring bulbs.
There is a yellow wood anemone, Anemone ranunculoides, with small yellow flowers. The second part of the botanical name means buttercup-like, and they are, but all anemones are buttercup family plants.
While the anemones described are very decorative, they are low-key in comparison with the vibrant red, pink or inky blue flowers of the De Caen anemone varieties, which have single flowers, or the St Brigid types, which have double flowers.
These are more open-ground plants in their native Mediterranean region and have very eye-catching flowers, lovely in a border or in containers in spring.
The related Anemone x fulgens is a brilliant red and looks especially dramatic in a rock garden.
These flowers also can be left in place year after year and allowed to clump up. Some of these kinds can be bought in flower in pots in spring or otherwise planted as tubers in autumn.
Some garden centres, just a few, are beginning to offer mini-plug plants of tender bedding, such as petunias and marigolds.
These are tiny plants, not long raised from seeds and only a couple of centimetres across in the root plug.
The plugs are like little cells in plastic trays, filled with compost and sown with bedding seeds, then grown on to seedling stage.
Some garden centres are beginning to offer mini-plug plants of tender bedding such as petunias and marigolds. The plug stage is often how bedding nurseries get their seedlings to pot on to sell as the usual flowering bedding plants.
Plugs are an intermediate step between sowing your own bedding from seed or buying bedding plants ready for planting in containers or in a flower bed.
The success rate is very good with plugs, given a bit of care and attention, and they are much cheaper to buy than finished bedding plants, certainly worth a try if you come across them.
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Anemones are a tenacious set of spring flowers – and they have needed to be this year. They have a good strategy for surviving harsh spring weather by closing their flowers against the rain, sleet or frost, and hanging the flower heads.
Even the leaves, durable as they are, draw back into a tighter knot and wait out the harsh weather.
The plants adopt this defensive mode, at a moment’s notice, when a chilling shower is threatened, for instance, and the skies darken.
Durability
The name anemone is Greek for windflower, a name sometimes used as an alternative to anemone, and hinting at its durability.
This durability is a family trait: all kinds of anemones can quickly adapt to the weather, and they are durable in other ways too.
Anemones are mostly plants of woodland or scrub and they need to get ahead of the trees and shrubs that will later cast shade over them.
For this reason, they have tubers, or fleshy roots, which are used to power rapid growth in spring and also keep the tubers alive during the dry days under the summer canopy.
The foliage of the spring anemones withers away not long after flowering, just like spring bulbs. By mid-summer, only traces of the withered leaves remain.
Although tuberous, anemones are rarely considered among the spring-flowering bulbous plants, possibly because the spring anemone foliage is very divided and fern-like.
Native
The wild wood anemone, Anemone nemorosa, is a native flower that appears in old woodland in many parts of the country and is one of the prettiest wild flowers.
It is often found in the company of primroses and bluebells, also natives of old woodland.
Wild plants vary in flower size and flower numbers and, over the years, some of the bigger and better forms have been selected and grown in gardens.
Plants showing a touch of pink or lavender colour have been selected too and are offered as garden varieties. This is a great little plant for a shady corner under shrubs or trees, as long as it gets its touch of the spring sunlight to set its seeds.
Reliable
The Greek anemone, Anemone blanda, is widely grown in gardens for its blue flowers, open and daisy-like in shape. It is a very easy flower to grow and completely reliable.
It increases its clump by spreading slowly underground, as the wood anemone does too, but somewhat more quickly, because it is a more vigorous plant. It loves light shade and well-drained ground.
There are pink and white forms of this anemone too, but the blue ones in denim-blue shades look great with yellow daffodils or other spring bulbs.
There is a yellow wood anemone, Anemone ranunculoides, with small yellow flowers. The second part of the botanical name means buttercup-like, and they are, but all anemones are buttercup family plants.
While the anemones described are very decorative, they are low-key in comparison with the vibrant red, pink or inky blue flowers of the De Caen anemone varieties, which have single flowers, or the St Brigid types, which have double flowers.
These are more open-ground plants in their native Mediterranean region and have very eye-catching flowers, lovely in a border or in containers in spring.
The related Anemone x fulgens is a brilliant red and looks especially dramatic in a rock garden.
These flowers also can be left in place year after year and allowed to clump up. Some of these kinds can be bought in flower in pots in spring or otherwise planted as tubers in autumn.
Some garden centres, just a few, are beginning to offer mini-plug plants of tender bedding, such as petunias and marigolds.
These are tiny plants, not long raised from seeds and only a couple of centimetres across in the root plug.
The plugs are like little cells in plastic trays, filled with compost and sown with bedding seeds, then grown on to seedling stage.
Some garden centres are beginning to offer mini-plug plants of tender bedding such as petunias and marigolds. The plug stage is often how bedding nurseries get their seedlings to pot on to sell as the usual flowering bedding plants.
Plugs are an intermediate step between sowing your own bedding from seed or buying bedding plants ready for planting in containers or in a flower bed.
The success rate is very good with plugs, given a bit of care and attention, and they are much cheaper to buy than finished bedding plants, certainly worth a try if you come across them.
Read more
Jobs to do in the garden this week
Gardening: Chocolate vine
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