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This week, we’re highlighting something for everyone to suit a variety of site conditions. We have woodland groundcover, Sedum ternatum, sunshine-loving native shrub, Hypericum x ‘Blue Velvet’, and the unique but underutilized meadow perennial, Eryngium yuccifolium. Each of these natives play critical ecological roles in the landscape, from providing crucial nectar sources for pollinators, to soil stabilization, and everything in between.
It’s native fern week! It’s been a while since we’ve explored some of the diverse and fascinating fern species that we have in abundance here at the Nursery, so this week we’re paying homage to these prehistoric plants and their often unseen and underappreciated attributes. Through a brief journey into the physiological, ecological, cultural and historical uses of these North American native ferns, we hope to leave you loving them as much as we do!
Just in time for Earth Day, we’ve approached that time of the season again where lots o’ crops are working on flushing themselves out, some of them inviting the gaze of admirers with the first colorful blooms of the season. It’s almost unfair and impossible to pinpoint simply one of the many lovely early Spring-flowering perennials that we offer here at Pleasant Run, so this week, we’re going to highlight several native selections that are in full spectacle and catching our eye. Without further ado, we bring you Geranium maculatum, Tiarella cordifolia ‘Brandywine’, and Aquilegia canadensis ‘Little Lanterns’.
This week, we’re enthusiastically promoting our crop of Mertensia virginica, which, as you read this, is slowly peaking its pink-and-periwinkle blooms above its velvety blue-green foliage. If you’ve been sleeping on this lovely little early spring-blooming perennial, now’s the time to familiarize yourself with it.
The emergence of the snowdrops and daffodils suggest rebirth and renewal as we step into the 2023 growing season. Meanwhile, cool-temperature-loving crops are waking from their slumber beneath their protective plastic domes. Of these early risers, Xanthorhiza simplicissima takes the subtle approach, blending into the fallen brown debris of last year’s growth and allowing only the most curious to seek out its hidden secrets. This week, we’re celebrating the ethnobotanical and ecological sides of Xanthorhiza simplicissima, known commonly as yellowroot, a highly underutilized native woodland shrub that has a lengthy and storied past.
