Winter wonder blooms Brighten your landscape this winter with hellebores, a hardy plant that starts flowering during the shortest, dreariest and coldest days of the year.
Brighten your landscape this winter with hellebores, a hardy plant that starts flowering during the shortest, dreariest and coldest days of the year.
Photo by L.A. Jackson
If you are an impatient gardener, good news: now is a great time to plant perennials.
But there is also bad news: you have to wait until at least spring to see the pretty results from your efforts. There are exceptions, of course, and one that goes to the head of my class in the garden is the hellebore.
The hardy hellebore ignores the chilling cold of winter and starts flowering during the shortest, dreariest days of the year to provide an early glimpse of what the glory of the coming spring garden will be. And even when other plants begin blooming as the temperatures warm, many hellebores still can’t be ignored because their fancy flower shows usually persist through the entire spring season.
While hellebores will enjoy well-worked soil, these tough plants don’t mind dry sites such as areas under trees where extensive root systems can be stiff competition for ground moisture. Filtered shade suits these pretties best, but they will also do just fine basking in the morning sun. And since hellebores are low-growing plants, potting them up so you can have a better look without getting down on all fours is certainly an option.
My established hellebores readily reseed and have formed ever-expanding clumps of handsome evergreen foliage. These flowing displays occasionally get singed by dry, cold winter winds, but I just prune out the marred leaves in the early spring and new ones readily sprout, making me forget about any damage done. Speaking of damage, don’t worry about Bambi—hellebores are deer-resistant.
While there are many types of hellebores, the one most often found at stores and online for sale is the Lenten rose (Helleborus x hybridus), the Perennial Plant Association’s 2005 Plant of the Year. Its impressive bloom show begins to dangle masses of bell-shaped blossoms in January or February and continues flaunting flowers until deep in the spring.
And did I mention colors? White, cream, pink, light green, yellow, purple, salmon—these and various variegations are the snappy hues of Lenten rose’s blossoms. If you need a visual aid to see how extensively the bloom colors of Lenten rose, as well as other hellebores, cover the range of the spectrum, bundle up and visit any of your local friendly nurseries this winter to see their selections in flower or, if you are impatient, check out Wayside Gardens’ (located in Hodges, South Carolina) online hellebore offerings at waysidegardens.com.
November in the Garden
• The pleasures of the past summer can brighten up holiday settings naturally with homegrown wreaths and garlands weaved from evergreen foliage, grapevines, onion and garlic stalks, corn husks and dried chilies.
• If moles or voles have been romping in your bulb beds, mix in liberal amounts of pea gravel or a rocky soil conditioner such as PermaTil into the growing ground to discourage their underground activities.
Tip of the Month
Another pretty possibility for your winter and spring garden is the bear claw hellebore (Helleborus foetidus), an easy online find that has fans of thin leaves resembling, well, bear claws. Give it space because this hellebore can form evergreen clumps up to three feet wide. Floating above the foliage are soothing mint-green, bell-shaped flowers hanging from stems that can reach upward to 30 inches high. It is sometimes tagged with the alternate, unflattering name of “stinking hellebore” because of the musty smell its leaves give off when crushed, so give your nose a break and leave the leaves alone.
L.A. Jackson is the former editor of Carolina Gardener magazine. Contact him at lajackson1@gmail.com.