Unique Plum Rosettes with Great Staying Power!
The petals open very slowly on this Clematis, keeping the flower looking fresh for many weeks! Plant Patent #16,012. Cultivar name: ‘Evipo020′. Now how’s this for a completely unique Clematis. Raymond Evison, a leading authority on Clematis, developed this utterly one-of-a-kind variety, and I think this time he’s really outdone himself. The flowers are double with an interesting rosette pattern, they demonstrate great staying power, and the bloomtime is a nice long 4 months or so. We can’t ask for much more from a Clematis than that.
Cassis is a marvel of a bloom, with plum-colored petals that open over a very long time, so that the flowers stay fresh (and look a bit different every day!) for weeks. Named for the blackcurrant drink so popular in Europe, this color is rich and distinctive, complementing all the reds, yellows, and blues around it in the sunny garden. And the flowers are simply mesmerizing — 3 inches wide and “stacked”.Nearly as exciting as the blooms is the length of time this plant flowers. Expect it to begin with the first breath of summer and to continue all the way into early fall. This is an evergreen Clematis bred for mild and warm climates, and you will love its staying power even in hot, humid summers.
Cassis reaches 6 feet high and 3 feet wide, making it a fine choice for containers as well as the garden. Space plants 2 feet apart for a continuous wall of color! Another Evison Clematis, super long-blooming Rosemoor, makes a fine companion to Cassis, as do all your Roses and open-habit shrubs. Just give this plant something to climb, and watch it take off! Like most Clematis, Cassis? prefers to have its roots cool and its tops warms, so mulch it well upon planting, and keep the soil evenly moist.
White-on-White Elegance for the Shade
The first Epimedium to bloom in spring.
Eager to make itself at home in your border, E. ogisui is a dense ground cover or accent planting for the shade, setting masses of pure white blooms of very distinctive form in early spring. Though not as tolerant of dry shade as many Epimediums, it is welcome for its magnificent blooms, which complement everything else in the garden.
These 1 1/2-inch flowers appear in early spring — before most other Epimedium have begun to bud! — on horizontal, wiry stems up to 2 feet long. Each features a bottom layer of 4 widely-spaced white petals, topped by a second layer of very slender white petals centered on top of the first, and itself topped by short, upright petals surrounding a tiny central boss of yellow stamens. Very elegant, and ready to help all neighboring blooms shine just a little brighter.
This plant also sports purple and bronze tints on its evergreen foliage in spring. Forming a dense, somewhat low-growing mound, E. ogisui reaches just 10 inches high when not in bloom, but readily spreads 18 to 24 inches wide and even beyond. This is a plant to naturalize in the garden, increasing your show of beauty every year without buying a single new plant.
Discovered in Sichuan, China, this plant is named for Mikinori Ogisu, the great Japanese plant hunter. It spreads by rhizomes, blooms profusely, and thrives in any moist, enriched garden soil in partial to full shade. In the native it is found among limestone deposits near waterfalls, but no such exotic conditions are necessary for its survival in your garden. It will not be happy in the dry shade beneath trees that many other Epimedium tolerate, however, so mulch it well and keep the plant watered throughout the growth season.