Grow Your Own Magazine

Just stood and watched a humming bird moth on our verbena bonensiaris (sp?) - watched it 'til my drink ran out!

They are great - the verbena - absolutely everything seems to love them, they've had all sorts of butterflies, bees and hovering things all over them and they look great too. They also flower for ages too.

Will deffo be putting them all round the garden. What other wildlife attractive long flowering 'highly recommended's' are there?

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Manda.

"Wouldn't it be nice
For maybe an hour
To not have a care."

You won't need to NBP te wil put themselves around the garden!!

if you leave the seed heads on, the birds like thm too.

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ntg

Never be afraid to try something new.
Remember that a lone amateur built the Ark.
A large group of professionals built the Titanic

http://grief-encounters.blogspot.com/

I knew you'd have an answer Nick - and your suggestion for 'highly recommended'?

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Manda.

"Wouldn't it be nice
For maybe an hour
To not have a care."

I have really struggled to grow Verbena Boriens....... - well you know the one! It always looks so lovely and cottagy and I could always imagine it with a butterfly on it (hopefully not a cabbage white).

Do they self seed or are they a herbacious perennial? I wonder if this far north it won't come through the winter.

Jennie

PS As you can guess I only got one plant to survive!

I love my Verbena B so much that I've taken cuttings. A friend did the same and all took and are flowering happily now.

The bees and butterflies love mine too - only problem is that I left mine from last year and didn't cut it back far enough so it's really tall - it's about 8 ft tall!! The wind has attacked it quite badly so I'll definitely cut it further back in spring next year to get it sprouting from the base (and hopefully stop it getting so leggy).

I think Dahlias can't be beaten for attracting the bees and butterflies.

I've also got one of those huge ornamental thistles (forgotten the name - but it's about 7-8ft tall and it's got silver leaves). The bees go mad for the purple flowers and I counted 5 bees sharing the same flower the other day! I think butterflies and bees must like purple

How about the well known Buddleia, Sedum Spectablis (Ice plant as my mum used to call it) Thyme,in flower, and Lavender I am doing a survey of Butterflies for the Natural History Museum in Paris and the numbers and different varieties I have seen have been just amazing. I always knew that we had a lot but this has really opened my eyes.

Thanks for the advice slug re cutting back verb. b., ours is only about 5' tall so you can see all the bugs quite well. We've also got some 'thistle-like' plants echinops and they're very popular and look different. I want to try some eryngium next year - Mrs Thingy's Ghost (not thingy but I can't remember her name!) sounds interesting.

We grew our V B from seed although germination was a bit erratic - not to sure how hardy it is.

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Manda.

"Wouldn't it be nice
For maybe an hour
To not have a care."

Verbena bonariensis survives through winter here, I just cut it down when it looks too dry & straggly. It doesn't seem to self seed much in my garden but comes up in the same spot each year apart from one lovely huge plant which has sprung up between the flags on the drive that is now about 3ft tall & ambushes people coming through the gateway.

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Into every life a little rain must fall.

Mine didn't self seed last year either (I was really being hopeful!), so that's why I've taken cuttings. I'll keep you posted on how easy/bad they are to root. They're all looking healthy at the moment, and they've been in the pot about 2 weeks so I'm taking it as a good sign that they've not yet died!

I tried to grow some from seed and they died - ho hum - love the plant but just can't grow it from seed.

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Best wishes
Andrewo
Harbinger of Rhubarb tales

The Eryngium is Miss Willmott's Ghost. Another set of plants beloved by butterflies are Inula especially I. acaulis.

And here is your Hummingbird Hawkmoth.

What cool photos palustris - did you take them in your garden?
Indeed Miss Wilmot - she used to go round gardens scattering the seeds didn't she?
The inula acaulis look good (thats the yellow flower right?).

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Manda.

"Wouldn't it be nice
For maybe an hour
To not have a care."

Yes, yes and yes!

you'll get a reputation!

what camera do you use?

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Manda.

"Wouldn't it be nice
For maybe an hour
To not have a care."

They are really good pictures. What camera do you use?

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[

The camera is a Fugi 5600. The shots were taken on Auto with Macro on and the Fast shoot facility for the second one of the moth thing. I actually took 56 shots to get three good ones.

Your not supposed to tell that you took all those foto's Palustris then people are in awe of your expertise

As to Verbena Bonariensis mine makes it thru the winter OK, I don't cut it down for two reasons
1) it looks good with frost on it in winter
2) the birds seem to love the seed heads
3 I'm an idle git

Ahh.... make that tree reasons.

Also mine has seeded itself all over the border & in the gravel as well although you can take cuttings I believe - never needed to try. As to growing from seed I just sowed it in MP compost & kept is in the greenhouse frost free & then pricked it out into cells till they were big enough to be potted on.

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ntg

Never be afraid to try something new.
Remember that a lone amateur built the Ark.
A large group of professionals built the Titanic

http://grief-encounters.blogspot.com/

Nick - I take it you did an autumn sowing? perhaps that is where I went wrong. My spring sowing didn't take off until September!

Palustris - wonderful photos!

To be honest Jennie, I can't remember it was 2 or 3 years ago & it's going strong still. I have the benefit of a heated bench in the greenhouse so it waas probably done around Christmas the same time as my Onions.

__________________
ntg

Never be afraid to try something new.
Remember that a lone amateur built the Ark.
A large group of professionals built the Titanic

http://grief-encounters.blogspot.com/

We have never bothered sowing Verbena seed. They self seed all over the place, especially in the gravel paths. So, all I ever do is weed them out of where I do not want them. As for cutting down, no point really. The big ones rarely survive our winters any way, only the babies.

Mine has only self-seeded itself between the slabs on the top of the front wall. It's made it though several winters and I've tried cutting in spring when it starts to shoot, but haven't tried to overwintered any.

Red valerian is also good for insects. That's where I saw a humming bird hawk moth last year - no photos though!

dear all,
I too sat tranfixed the other day when a h.h.m. came to feed.
I grabbed the camera and the movement frightened it a bit, but it soon came back.What a delight.

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Retirement is when you stop living at work and start working at living

Love your signature quote Plot 11.

I find Verbena B. self seeds all over - I did up the plantlets and give them to friends or charity Plant sales.

Last year I bought a scabious - have lost the plant label - it's not the big purple flowers that you see in florists but is a tallish and straggly perennial with many small purple scabious flowers. I've deadheaded it regularly.The bees and other insects love it - altho I haven't seen any butterflies.

Cheers,