Spring Flowering Perennials

Blue Star Flower- Amsonia

Zone: 3-9

Light Requirements: Full Sun to Part Shade

Soil preference: Average, medium, well drained soil

Pests/disease: No serious pest/disease issues.

Attributes: Clump forming, feathery green foliage with varying shades of blue flowers in the spring and golden fall color.

Our Experience: We’ve utilized amsonia on Great Hill in our perennial borders with great success. Amsonia adds beautiful color to the spring landscape and remains a textural attribute throughout the summer until it steals the show once again in the fall with it’s feathery golden colored plumage. To reduce mass, and retain shape, plants can be cut back 1/3 to ½ after flowering. Grows 24-36.”

Columbine- Aquilegia

Zone: 3-8

Light requirements: full to part sun

Soil Preference: average moist well drained soil

Pests/Disease: leaf miner, powdery mildew, Rust

Attributes: Mid may-June, bonnet like flower. Blooms come in a variety of colors. Great for groundcover and naturalizing. Attracts hummingbirds and butterflies.

Our Experience: Columbine grow wild in our woodland garden areas, as well as unexpectedly along borders and walls. We enjoy blooms ranging from white to red. Deadheading will encourage a second bloom. Foliage begins dying back around mid summer.

Jack in the Pulpit- Arisaema

Zone: 4-9

Light Requirements: Full Shade to Part Shade

Soil Preference: Medium to wet soil

Pests/disease: None serious

Attributes: Jack in the pulpit is a spring flowering woodland perennial growing 1-2’ tall. It has three parted leaves and an erectly spiked flower that is covered by a hood. The flower is usually striped green and purple though color variations exist. Plants are hermaphroditic.

Our Experience: Our “jacks” are a kind of prized possession to our resident shade/woodland gardener. Its common practice for her to point out the location of the various specimens around the property so they aren’t mistakenly trampled, or leaf blown. Beautiful and unique, these plants seem to thrive with little to no disturbance. Flowering plants that do not go dormant, will form a cluster of red berries late in the summer.

False Indigo- Baptisia

Zone: 3-9

Light Requirements: Full Sun to Part Shade

Soil Preference: Average, dry to medium, well drained soil

Pests/disease: No serious insect or disease problems

Attributes: Host to many butterfly species and native to the northeast. Purple blue lupine like flowers bloom in the spring atop mounding blueish green foliage. Erect black seed pods provide fall interest and popular additions to cut flower arrangements.

Our Experience: Baptisia is a beautiful spring flowering addition to many of our perennial borders. This plant is difficult to divide and or transplant once established. Be sure to place it in a spot that’ll get enough sun year round to avoid staking. Grows 24-36.”

Siberian Bugloss- Brunnera

Zone: 3-8

Light Requirements: Part Shade to shade

Soil Preference: Average, medium moisture, well drained soil

Pests/disease: Occasional slug/snail damage

Attributes: Clump forming shade perennial with large, textured, heart shaped leaves and contrasting tiny blue raceme flowers on slender 18” stems.

Our Experience: Brunnera provides three season interest in many shade garden areas on the hill. Often utilized here as a striking ground cover (especially when using variegated cultivars) with the added bonus of forget-me-not airy blue flowers that persist throughout the spring. If/when foliage grows tired or gets sun burnt, prune to the ground and new leaves will regenerate. Grows 12-15.”

Lily of the Valley- Convallaria

Zone: 2-7

Light Requirements: Part Shade to Shade

Soil Preference: Moist, fertile, well drained soil

Pests/disease: Aphids, spider mites and leaf spot. This plant is invasive in the mid-west.

Attributes: A classic ground cover that’s vigorous in growth, with sweet smelling white or pink bell-shaped flowers in the spring.

Our Experience: Lily of the valley is a flowering woodland perennial which has been planted in several shaded garden locations on Great Hill and has naturalized itself into many others. This plant will occasionally fruit in the fall with orange red berries, adding multi-seasonal interest. Grows 6-8.”

Yellow corydalis- Corydalis lutea

Zone: 4-8

Light Requirements: Part sun to Shade

Soil Preference: Average, well-drained, medium soil.

Pests and Disease: No serious pest or disease problems

Attributes: A mounding perennial with green, fern like leaves and yellow locket shaped flowers growing 12 to 18”. Yellow corydalis is a prolific bloomer that’s perfect for semi shaded, naturalized or woodland gardens.

Our Experience: Corydalis lutea grows happily in our shade garden on Great Hill. Blooms appear in the spring and persist for long periods, often re appearing in the fall when moisture needs are met. Perfect for pops of color along a woodland path or in a rock garden. Self-seeds readily.

Larkspur- Delphinium

Zone: 4-7

Light Requirements: Full Sun to Part Shade

Soil Preference: Humus rich, medium moisture, well drained soil

Pests/disease: powdery mildew, botrytis blight, leaf spots and crown rot, also slugs, snails. Aphids, leaf miners, mites, and stem borers, rodents

Attributes: leaves are palmately cleft into five deeply cut lobes. They sprout basal cluster of long-petioled leaves that terminates in a tall spire of blue-violet flowers in late May early June.

Plants grow anywhere from 18-24”, with some giant varieties reaching over 36”

Our Experience: Some years are more successful than others. These are relatively high maintenance plants requiring significant tying, staking, deadheading, and disease prevention in order for them to flourish. We have had less issue with disease and pests, but our most significant issues have been with rodents destroying new growth.

Bleeding Heart- Dicentra

Zone: 4-8

Light Requirements: Part sun to shade

Soil Preference: Average, medium moisture, well drained (but consistently moist) soil

Pests/disease: Some susceptibility to, aphids, powdery mildew, slugs and snails.

Attributes: A popular shade perennial with pendant, heart shaped flowers and finely textured foliage.

Our Experience: Dicentra adds beautiful color and texture to our woodland shade garden throughout the spring/summer months. It’s an excellent addition to any garden with shade in that its flowers persist long after shady spring ephemerals have expired (if the soil is kept moist). We’ve had fun experimenting with many dicentra varieties and cultivars, which come in an array of heights and bloom/foliage colors. Newer cultivars grow 12-18,” but the old-fashioned bleeding hearts can grow 24-36.”

Cushion Spurge- Euphorbia polychroma

Zone: 4-8

Light Requirements: Full sun to part shade

Soil Preference: Average well-drained soil.

Pests and Disease: No serious pest or disease problems

Attributes: Cushion spurge is a mounding, clump forming perennial with dense, flattened golden yellow flowers in the spring (showy bracts) and green leaves that turn brilliant shades of red, purple and orange in the fall. Plants grow 12 to 18” and thrive in dry, poor soils.

Our Experience: This euphorbia is a beautiful addition to not only beds and borders, but seasonal containers as well. While true flowers are inconspicuous, showy yellow bracts are long lasting and very ornamental. Fall foliar color is phenomenal. While this plant is impervious to a myriad of conditions, it has proven, at least on the hill, to not be as rabbit proof as advertised and is frequently eaten.

Hellebore-Helleborus

Zone: 6-8

Soil Preference: Neutral to Alkaline, moist, organically rich, humusy soil

Light Requirements: Part Shade, Full Shade

Attributes: Late winter, early spring flower, attractive evergreen foliage with a clumping habit, grows approximately 18-24”. Divided leaves on straight stalks, sprout directly from the soil. Wonderful addition to woodland gardens or shady areas.

Pests/ Disease: no issues

Our Experience: We use hellebore as an attractive ground cover underneath focal trees and shrubs, as well as in the woodland garden. Unique foliage and  flowers bloom in late winter  providing the first notes of spring. Very low maintenance, prune off spent or damaged leaves.

Iris- Iris

Zone: 5-9

Light Requirements: Full Sun

Soil Preference: Neutral to Alkaline, organically rich, well drained soil. Does not do well in Clay-like soils

Pests/ Disease: Slugs, snails, white flies, thrips, aphids. Mosaic Viruses, Leaf spot, root rot, bacterial soft rot, crown rot. Most disease issues can be avoided by proper placement and bed maintenance.

Attributes: An iris flower has three upright petals called standards, and three hanging sepals that resemble petals called falls. Bright flowers come in a wide array of colors, grow on tall spire-like stems and have grass-like leaves.

Our Experience: We grow a few different variety of iris, including reblooming Bearded Iris, Dutch Iris and Siberian Iris. We have not had specific issues with disease or pests. They do take some routine maintenance such as pruning and dividing, as well as a second fertilization in July to encourage a strong second bloom in specific varieties.

Spring vetchling- Lathyrus vernus

Zone: 3-9

Light Requirements: Full to part shade

Soil Preference: Average, well-drained, medium soil.

Pests and Disease: No serious pest or disease problems

Attributes: Spring vetchling is a woodland perennial that is a close cousin to the annual sweet pea it so resembles. This plant grows 12-18” and is clump forming with rose pink pea like flowers in the early spring. Spring vetchling likes to be kept moist and goes dormant during the hot summer months.

Our Experience: We grow this spring perennial along several garden border beds that weave through transition areas on Great Hill. They bloom around the same time as our late season tulips and daffodils adding to spring color and appeal when most of our statement perennials are still dormant.

Virginia Blue Bells- Mertensia

Zone: 3-9

Light Requirements: Shade to Part shade

Soil Preference:  Average, medium, well drained soils

Pests/disease: None Serious

Attributes: A beautiful, early blooming, woodland perennial with trumpet like pendulous flowers that emerge pink and mature to a light blue color.

Our Experience: We utilize bluebells in our shade garden. The blooms are long lasting and persist throughout the spring. As they are dormant during the summer months, be sure to plant alongside later emerging perennials. Grows 12-24.”

Mukgenia

Zone: 3-9

Light Requirements: Sun to part shade

Soil Preference: Moist, fertile, well drained soils

Pests/disease: None serious

Attributes: An intergeneric cross between Mukdenia and Bergenia. Has thick fleshy leaves that display a beautiful fall color, and red flower spikes that display small, ornamental white flowers in the spring. Grows 8-10,” is spreading and likes wet conditions.

Our Experience: After great success with one parent plant of this perennial, mukdenia, we decided to trial this perennial a couple of years ago after rave reviews from our grower. It comes with many bonuses and three season interest. It’s far more sun tolerant than mukdenia, giving it a wider range of visibility here on the hill. It’s fall color far surpasses mukdenia as well in that its leaves turn deeper and more brilliant shades of red, purple, and orange, and tend not to dry out and die back as readily. Its flowers in the spring are as small as mukdenias, but they are pink instead of white and sit atop a much longer red flower spike helping them to stand out and become much more of an ornamental feature in an early spring garden.

Peony- Paeonia

Zone: 3-8

Soil Preference: Medium moisture well drained rich soil. Amend soil with compost as needed before planting.

Pests/Disease: Little to no pests, powdery mildew can be a problem on the foliage late in the season.

Light Requirements: Prefers full sun to part Shade

Attributes: Peonies typically grow 30”-36” tall by mid-spring, they bloom early spring, and contribute attractive deeply lobed large leaf foliage to the garden the rest of the season. They die back to the ground after frost.

Our Experience: Peony are a long blooming beautiful addition to the spring landscape and provide great cut flowers.

Phlox

Zone: 4-8

Light Requirements: Sun to Part Shade

Soil Preference: Medium moisture, well drained soil

Pests/disease: Many, unfortunately. Phlox bug, powdery mildew, root rot and spider mites, to name a few.

Attributes: The endless cultivars of phlox can benefit your garden in a myriad of ways. From low growing ground phlox to tall garden phlox and a number in between. What each phlox variety/cultivar has in common is that it’ll bring both color and texture to your garden. Plant the native phlox stolonifera (creeping phlox) to add color and groundcover to your spring woodland garden or tall garden phlox (paniculata) to add showy, late summer color to your perennial border garden.

Our Experience: We’ve had many cultivars of garden phlox in multiple garden locations on Great Hill. We’ve used creeping phlox to complement our border gardens with spring color and textured ground cover. We’ve also planted many different selections of tall garden phlox both in our English and Monet gardens. Over time, our phlox has been failing. The combination of rabbit damage and root rot has dwindled its presence in our gardens. Phlox is so well sought after by rabbits and ground hogs in the English border garden, that any attempts to replant have been abandoned and other perennials of similar height/bloom time (anemone, monarda, eupatorium, etc.) have replaced them.

May Apple- Podophyllum

Zone: 3-9

Light Requirements: Part Shade to Shade

Soil Preference: Average medium moisture well drained soils

Pests/disease: None Serious

Attributes: Northeast native, woodland wildflower with huge, umbrella like leaves and single (often hidden) white flowers. Adaptable to soil conditions and dormant in the summer months.

Our Experience: May apple, to us, is worth laying on your belly for. In order to gawk at its simple but showy, perfect white flowers each spring, you often have to lie down. We have a large swath of it in the shade garden acting as a spring groundcover. Flowers give way to greenish yellow fruit. Grows 8-16.”

Jacobs ladder- Polemonium

Zone: 3-8

Light Requirements: Full Sun to Part Shade

Soil Preference: Moist, well drained soils

Pests/disease: None Serious

Attributes: A mounding perennial growing 12- 18” with light blue bell shaped flower clusters appearing in the spring. Jacobs ladder prefers moist, rich, partly sunny areas, and is often found along streams and throughout woodlands where it grows wild.

Our Experience: We feature several sprawling clumps of Jacobs ladder in our shade garden on Great Hill. Their early spring flowers are light, airy and reliably present so long as they’re properly placed. Dormancy will occur in hot/dry summer climates.

Solomons Seal- Polygonatum

Zone: 3-9

Light Requirements: Part shade to shade

Soil Preference: Moist, organically rich, well-drained soil

Pests/disease: Slugs and leaf spot rarely

Attributes: There are many different cultivars of solomons seal ranging in height, leaf and bloom color. All plants, though, have arching, branchless stems and tubular white, green, or green-yellow flowers hanging from each node in the spring. They are essential plants for your woodland garden adding to three seasons of interest in the fall with dark blue fruit and yellow leaves.

Our Experience: Solomon’s seal is utilized heavily in our shade and Japanese gardens. In the Japanese garden, we use a dwarf form as an architectural ground cover and in the shade, we use variegated solomon’s seal that adds height, texture and color to our woodland garden.

Primrose- Primula

Zone: 4-8

Light Requirements: Part Shade

Soil Preference: Consistently moist, well drained soils

Pests/disease: Slugs/snails, aphids, mites and powdery mildew.

Attributes: One of springs earliest bloomers with showy bright flowers in a range of colors and large, textured leaves.

Our Experience: A harbinger of spring, it’s one of the earliest perennial plants to bloom, prompting full blown gardener’s euphoria over the new growing season here on the hill. While these plants require moist conditions during the growing season, they tend not to return if not allowed adequate drainage during the winter months. Great to use at the front of a border or as an edging plant in the shade. Grows 6-20” depending on variety.

Lungwort- Pulmonaria

Zone: 3-9

Light Requirements: Part Shade to Shade

Soil Preference: Average, medium moisture, well drained soil

Pests/disease: Powdery mildew, slugs and snails

Attributes: A clump forming shade perennial with “moon silver” spotted leaves and drooping clusters of pink to purple-blue early spring blooms.

Our Experience: We’ve found pulmonaria benefits from being cut back after bloom to encourage new/invigorated foliar growth. This plant will go dormant during the summer months if the soil is not kept sufficiently moist. They look their best when grouped in masses as an edging plant, either on paths, or in large beds. Plants grow 12-18.”

Blood Root- Sanguinaria

Zone: 3-8

Light Requirements: Part shade to Shade

Soil Preference: Moist, organically rich, well-drained soil

Pests/disease: None Serious

Attributes: Early spring blooming woodland wildflower reaching 6-10” and forming large wild colonies along the forest floor. The flowers emerge wrapped in one of the plants scalloped leaves which unfurls during the day to reveal the small, white, multi petaled bloom. Plants continue to grow until they go dormant in the summer heat.

Our Experience: Blood Root is a great attribute to our shade garden in the spring. The flower is an eye catching beauty when present, otherwise, the plants leaves steal the show with their unique shape, color and texture. These plants are virtually maintenance free and they thrive when left on their own to naturalize.

Upright Wild Ginger- Saruma henryi

Zone: 5-8

Light Requirements: Full to part shade

Soil Preference: Rich, moist, well drained soils.

Pests and Disease: No serious pest or disease problems

Attributes: A clump forming shade perennial with heart shaped leaves that prefers wet sites and grows to 2’. Flowers in the spring are yellow and three petaled, sometimes sporadically reappearing in the summer months.

Our Experience: We’ve trialed saruma in our shade garden as well as in shady wooded areas throughout Great Hill. While it hasn’t thrived, we are also on the dry side of its preference and marginally zoned. When happy, this ginger adds a lot more texture and height to the garden as opposed to other wild gingers.

Wood Lily- Trillium

Zone: 4-8

Light Requirements: Shade to Part Shade

Soil Preference: Rich, moist, well drained soils

Pests/disease: Non serious. Deer damage.

Attributes: Trillium is a spring flowering woodland perennial who’s leaves, petals and sepals all come in groups of three. There are a vast number of cultivars with differences in flower and leaf color/texture. Trillium go dormant in the summer when allowed to dry out. They are very long lived.

Our Experience: We have a three different trillium species on the hill, each striking and unique additions to our shade garden and woodland areas. These species are;, great white trillium, red trillium and yellow trillium. Our great white trillium are especially willing to travel, often found hidden (though massive) in plain sight under large evergreen shrubs or amongst other perennials in shady, wet areas. In the absence of deer browsing, we’d very likely have many more of these native plants on the hill.

Spreading Bellwort- Uvularia

Zone: 3-8

Light Requirements: Shade to Part Shade

Soil Preference: Average, medium, well drained soil

Pests/disease: None Serious

Attributes: Uvularia is an early spring perennial (and often woodland wild flower) with soft yellow flowers and bright yellow-green leaves.

Our Experience: This woodland addition adds a distinctive yellow color to the range of other spring flowering bulbs and ephemerals. Its unique habit makes for a great spring groundcover, though it does go dormant in the summer when dry. Grows 4-10.”

Yellowroot- Xanthorhiza simplicissima

Zone: 3-9

Light Requirements: Part Shade

Soil Preference: Moist, well drained soils

Pests/Disease: None serious

Attributes: Yellowroot is a low growing shrubby groundcover reaching 2-3’ that thrives in damp, shady areas. It features lacy leaves with a great fall color display as well as a unique panicle of star shaped maroon flowers that appear in the early spring.

Our Experience: Yellowroot has formed a colony of suckering roots around our shaded fountain garden. It provides seasons long foliage with a fall color display later in the season. While deer leave this plant alone, rabbits tend to chew the new growth early in the season.