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GROUNDCOVER

Postage : Seeds only $4 / Plants $20

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  • Oenothera
  • Origanum
    • vulgare ‘Thumble's Variety’   CAG02775

      (Oregano)
      Height5cmWidth40cmFlowering SeasonSpringWaterM - LLightSun
      CURRENTLY UNAVAILABLE

      An attractive chartreuse groundcover forming a very flat dense mat of soft, rounded leaves. A flowing foil for brightly coloured flowers, magenta or electric blue are always winners with chartreuse, or as lift beneath the eaves of sombre foliaged shrubs.

      Foamy heads of small near white flowers in rosy bracts lend a free spirited beauty in spring.

      Just as tasty as the boring green forms but much more sun tolerant and reliable than O. vulgare ‘Aureum’, though not as brassy in colour, which it has superseded in the nursery.

  • Pelargonium

    (Storksbill)
    Geraniaceae

    Not to be confused with Geranium commonly encountered in temperate gardens. Pelargonium offers a diversity of growth habits, form and foliage for warmer climates and have little tolerance of cold winters.

    Species from winter rainfall southern Africa are mostly drought loving and favour lean sandy soils, prime targets for exploitation in Perth gardens.

    The common "Geraniums" of Australian gardens are typically hybrids involving summer rainfall species, developed for hot house culture elsewhere and are of variable hardiness on the west coast. Many struggle with dry heat and high leaf surface temperatures while some, predominantly older varieties, can be very robust.
  • Phlox
  • Rehmannia
    • elata ‘Romantic Affair’   CAG00965
      Height60cmWidth1mFlowering SeasonSp - SuWaterMLightPart Shade
      Rehmannia elata ‘Romantic Affair’
      CURRENTLY UNAVAILABLE

      A Chinese perennial with flat rosettes of jagged, dark green, red backed, velvety leaves form a dense carpet from which arises slender stems, elegantly bearing large, very showy, nodding, trumpet shaped, yellow throated, pale pink flowers. Very romantic as the name suggests.

      Easily grown in moist, well drained, preferably alkaline soil in a sheltered site and very vigorous when happy.

      Winter dormant.

  • Rosmarinus
    • officinalis ‘Roman Beauty’   CAG02681

      (Rosemary)
      Height25cmWidth60cmFlowering SeasonSp - SuWaterLLightFull Sun
      CURRENTLY UNAVAILABLE

      The best prostrate Rosemary I've ever grown. White stems and fine needle like leaves that reveal their white underbelly lend a silvery appearance to a dense and trailing mound forming shrub with flowers of good clear blue-lavender.

      If it has a fault it is that it never grows as quickly as you would like it to.

      Tough and hardy in any reasonably drained soil as per other Rosemary but slow growth and finer form offers potential for container vignettes.

  • Salvia

    (Sage)
    Lamiaceae

    A genus whose popularity has risen exponentially in recent times. Offering a diverse range of form and colour there is a Salvia for nearly every garden situation with more and more being discovered and described all the time. The count now stands somewhere in excess of 1000, including subspecies, according to The Plant List. They are found on every continent except Antarctica.

    From a gardeners perspective they can not all be treated the same, they come from many different climates after all, but as a rule of thumb can be grouped into winter rainfall and summer rainfall species and with few exceptions they all prefer well drained soil.

    Soft leaved species from Central and South America are usually autumn and winter flowering. Coming from summer rainfall areas they typically need protection from dry heat and the accompanying high light intensity and they vary in their tolerance of winter damp. As with most plants the larger the leaves the more water they require, this also dictates how fast they grow with many growing several metres in a single season.

    Species from south western North America, South Africa, the Mediterranean and the Canary Islands are all winter growers and are tolerant or demanding of dry heat and summer drought. Slower growing but usually longer lived these all tend to have small, densely haired, silver or grey leaves or a combination of these traits which help them conserve moisture. Most of these require no additional water in Perth and are well adapted to our climate. They tend tend to flower from spring into summer.


    Prune back to where vigorous new basal growth is seen, never to dead wood, they appear to store little food in their stems and without leaves stand a chance of starving to death or at least struggle to regenerate. The exception is those few that are tuberous or clump forming, these can be cut to ground level once the stems start dying back in late autumn.
    • cacaliifolia   CAG00575
      Height60cmWidth1.2mFlowering SeasonSp - AuWaterM - HLightLight Shade
      Salvia cacaliifolia
      CURRENTLY UNAVAILABLE

      Sprawling stems bear unusual, almost triangular, cordate and broadly toothed, rubbery green leaves and branched spikes of small, pitcher shaped, electric blue flowers with protruding stamens throughout the warmer months. Never showy but greatly intriguing and in time makes an attractive groundcover. I've seen it used spilling over limestone retaining walls beneath high canopied trees, exposing its form and colour to great effect.

      From high altitude in mountains southerly to the Gulf of Mexico, cold tolerant and growing merrily through winter while more warmth requiring species stall. For any well drained sheltered site. Little resistance to dryness but otherwise easy and improving with age.

  • Saxifraga
    • stolonifera   CAG02948

      (Strawberry saxifrage)
      Height15cmWidth1mFlowering SeasonSpringWaterHLightShade
      Saxifraga stolonifera
      CURRENTLY UNAVAILABLE

      A rampant groundcover for moist shade. Popular for its round, scalloped, coarsely haired, silver veined leaves and clouds of white butterfly-like flowers borne briefly in spring. Forming a dense colony of plantlets by means of rosy red stolons, particularly nice draping from a hanging basket, which provide a too easy means of propagation and to which it owes its common name.

      Tends to desiccate in our low humidity summers but its vigour soon compensates during cooler, humid weather to the point that it may need annual thinning.

      Not hardy but unique, lovely and easy to grow, if you can provide it with a choice spot. Maybe as a groundcover between large ferns and cool climate shrubs.

  • Scutellaria
    • californica   CAG02226
      Height20cmWidth60cmFlowering SeasonSpringWaterL - MLightPart Shade
      Scutellaria californica
      CURRENTLY UNAVAILABLE

      A quiet little performer, slowly carpeting via underground stolons and an ideal groundcover under Roses or other flowering shrubs from whose shelter it will benefit. Soft stems, clothed in alternate pairs of small, dark green, rose tinted, scalloped, ovate leaves, emerge from the soil with the onset of winter rain. By spring the stems have lengthened, now wearing apple green, elliptical leaves, and bear short, one sided spikes of tubular, two lipped, pure white flowers. Dainty and elegant.

      Minimal water required during summer dormancy but strictly for light soils.

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