A Flower For Every Day September

Although Etyngium giganteam flowers earlier in the summer, it is in September when it loses its colour substance and becomes a whitened ghost. The great gardeners of the beginning of the century appreciated this prickly subject, which has all the soft colour and good contour of an eryngitim when it first comes out but becomes white and papery instead of fading. The famous Miss Willmott of Warley loved it so much that it is sometimes known as "Miss Willmott's Ghost" and the late Gertrude Jekyll loved it too. It is a biennial and sows itself generously, but with its long tap-roots it must be moved before it gets too big.

Most of the michaelmas daisies wait until October to come into their full glory, but the amellus type are earlier, and such old friends as King George in rich blue, Brilliant in deep pink and the pale pink Sonia come out in September. One of the most refined of these single asters is Ultramarine which has rather smaller flowers in very dark blue, on long stalks. But I have never found it as easy as the others, which are still with me, while Ultramarine is not. A newer one, and a very reliable variety, is Lac de Geneve in medium blue.

Aster frileartii is a hybrid between A. ante us and thompsonii. It is taller than either and rather more delicate in colouring and construction although very strong constitutionally. It needs to be planted rather far back in the border and its delicate form and colour show up against pink dahlias. People have different ideas of colour. I would call the large flowers of A. frikartii (Glory of Staffa) lavender blue, and the centres golden, yet I see it is described by one nursery as "peacock blue with orange centre".

Many of the ericoides and cordifolia asters bloom in October, but there is one which is at its best in September. A. ericoides Delight is a most graceful plant, with branching, whippy stems covered with tiny white flowers. It lasts well in water and does for the flower arranger what Aster tradescantii does later on Against the reds and golds of the turning leaves the autumn gentians make a wonderful carpet of blue. To get a real effect I think these gentians should be grown as a drift and not dotted about in small clumps. I shall never forget a long bed of gentians in full flower in the garden of Sissinghurst Castle, or the carpets of blue on either side of a path that winds down through the trees to the lake in front of Forde Abbey.

Those of us with lime-ridden soil have to resort to all manner of expedients to keep our lime-hating gentians. In one garden I know they were planted in old buckets and washtubs, filled with peat and sunk in the soil, with adequate holeage, of course. I have tried all sorts of things For some reason they don't get on too well in small troughs filled with peat, but in a wet year I have adequate success in a raised peat bed, made with outside walls of peat blocks and a filling of peat mould.

They are quite happy in old kitchen sinks, sunk below ground level and filled to the brim with peat mixed with a little sand. But again they need plenty of water. In a wet summer those hidden sinks are a sheet of blue, with Gentiana macaulayi and G. newbutyi competing with C. sino-ornata in their lustiness.

I used to have a G. Kidbrook seedling but it disappeared one dry summer. G. Inverleith still lingers on in a sink near the garden door. It doesn't increase, but on the other hand it hasn't died, so I leave it where I can enjoy to the full the intense blue of the flowers. I don't know whether it is particularly ungainly in its growth or whether I notice it more in the sink, but it does seem to have unusually long and unkempt straggling stems after it has finished flowering

My latest adventure with Gentiana sino-orttata seems to be the most successful of all. When we bought this house we had to make our own electricity and a little stone shed had been built on to the back of the house When we had mains service the little shed was used for apples, tools and odds and ends, and I can't think why I didn't realise it was an unnecessary excrescence years ago. Not only did it spoil an excianse of beautiful wall, but it took up space that could be used more usefully.

When at last I came to my senses and had the shed removed I realised I had space for a bed facing north, one of the most desirable places in the garden for all manner of plants.

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