spikey archetectural plant wanted suggestions please ? N.E scotland

jammy_dodger

hi all

i have a large slate mulched area that i am intending to plant through , on a recent visit to garden centre saw some beautiful phormiums variagated type at a whopping £44.00 :eek: they were large specimens , on reading up they are far too tender for my area it gets minus five in the summer here:D

so i am looking for something of a similar ilk , large and spikey , that will grow away quite happily , i dont mind wrapping it i winter but it has to be very hary as it got down to minus 22 this winter ..

suggestions and advice welcome cheeers

valentina

Not really at all like a phormium (!) but how about fatsia japonica, or trachycarpus fortuneii - they are architectural but hardy.

Kay_Peel

I'd say - go for your dream! I've seen Phormium Tenax growing happily in parts of Scotland, Ireland and Cumbria. I also think that the slate mulch will provide it with a really good chance of survival (as well as looking just fantastic!)

It will be no use getting a little plant and hoping that it will acclimatise to short summers and freezing winters. You have to get a big fellow who is already established and has a stout, strong base and root system because it's the big fellows that can put up a fight against frost, winds, rain and snow. That's not going to be cheap.

You have to protect the base of the plant in winter - I use fern bracken and straw. The older leaves seem to survive well but newer growth is always the first to fall foul of the weather - so you might have to wrap or cover the base of new shoots.

It will look bedraggled, but I just cut off the damaged bits and they soon grow back.

Of course, there's no guarantee. Many phormiums keeled over during the severe, prolonged winter that we've just been through. But so did more hardy plants and shrubs. I feel that we gardeners should only give up on architectural plants after we've tried, failed, tried again and failed again. And while we're trying, we're learning - and that's a good thing.

Good luck - be positive!

bertiebots

I have an iris that looks very much like the plant you want. Its common name is stinking iris and its tough as old boots will grow anywhere and will probably be a lot less than £44! It has unusual seed pods in autumn full of large orange/red berrys and grows into large dense spikey clumps.
Sorry I cant find a decent pick....not anything that looks as good as mine anyway lol! Btw it doesnt stink!...

edit: its evergreen.And you can get a variegated one.

jammy_dodger

Oooo kay peel you sound like a gardener after my own heart i am usually terrible when i see something i want in my garden i refuse to compromise i am quite the opposite otherwise and will hunt down a bargain and go without but not where my garden is concerned .

Bertie bots i shall google the stinking iris i do have iris on the edges of my wildlife pond never thought of planting iris away from water but a s you say it has the right foliage i am after cheers

valentina thank you too for your suggestions , i have a japinoca in the garden and is a stunning plant shall look up trachycarpusits a ne wone on me many thanks

zarazara

artichoke ,look like massive grey-green leaved thistles with beautiful purple flowers. They are magnificent and easy to grow.

Davesnave

To be frank, no phormium, no matter how large, is going to come through -22C unscathed. Around me, the temperatures dipped to 'only' -15C and the Torbay palms and phormiums were fine, but down in the valleys they hit -20C and these two plants were wrecked.

If you go for the artichoke, choose between the edible kind or Cynara cardunculus which has a thistle-like flower....

.....Which leads me neatly to my tentative suggestion, though it comes with a health warning: the Scotch Thistle, Onopordum acanthium. Surely you haven't overlooked that? Be warned though, if you let it seed, you'll have more than a few!:eek:

On safer ground, Eryngium giganteum 'Miss Wilmotts Ghost' or 'Silver Ghost' will seed around without getting out of hand, and other perennial Eryngiums, like varifolium, also fit the bill. They all survived here OK.

westiea

hi

Remember it is not just about cold - palms can survive quite low temperatures - for a short while - the same can be said for Phormium tenax (not its colourful cultivars however). It is long cold periods ,add in very wet - those are the biggest killers.

You also need to consider the micro climate in your garden - are there plants that die and survive in different areas of your garden. In windy areas, leaves of any long palm or 'strap like' plant will be shredded - not a great look!

However as Dave points out -22 is pretty hard for most!!!!! I presume your on the east coast?

Could you plant in a pot perhaps that can be lifted and placed in a cool greenhouse or shed over winter,? Another idea is to wrap it through the worst of the cold winters - with fleece and straw?

Another suggestion you cold look at are
Cardoon (Cynara carduncuus) - it can grow in Aberdeen without any problems.


good luck

twinklefish

I've just googlged Phormium Tenax to see what it looks like and you see these all over Aberdeen. There are some in the 'landscaped' aread done at the shops at the Bridge of Dee especially near the Boots store. They must be pretty tough to survive next to that busy road. The flowering stems are stunning in the summer.

Tx