Deliciously Fragrant Heirloom Flowers By Marie Iannotti
Sweetly Scented Flowers for Your Garden
Gardeners today are blessed with seemingly endless plant choices for their gardens. It's true, hundreds of new plants are introduced each year and many are just too tempting to resist. However most modern plants have been bred for color, size, shape, or some form of resistance. With the exception of David Austin's delicious roses, the one attribute overlooked is fragrance.
Fragrance is one of the first features to come to mind, when we think of flowers, yet it is often missing from gardens entirely. What would spring be without the enveloping perfume of lilacs? A rose just isn't a rose without scent and Sweet Autumn Clematis lets us know the season might be winding down, but the memory will linger.
One easy way to bring more fragrance back into your garden is with heirloom flowers, those old-fashioned open pollinated plants that were garden staples for years. The term heirloom generally refers to plants that are at least 50 years old and the seed has been passed down from gardener to gardener. Some come with stories or a provenance, but many are just old standards.
These older flowers are often taller than modern hybrids and sometimes a bit messier in growth habit - perfect for a cottage garden. Since they are open pollinated, most will reseed themselves throughout your borders and generally make themselves at home, without a lot of effort on your part.
Four O'Clock (Mirabilis jalapa)
The bright, cheerful flowers of Four O'Clocks often go unnoticed, because they don't open until late in the afternoon. However once they do, you are treated to an orange-scented aroma that wafts through the air. Plant them near your outdoor seating area and bask in this wonderful scent. The flowers remain open until morning and will even bloom during the day, if the weather is overcast.
Plants can be started by either tubers or seed. They can become a nuisance in warmer climates, but gardeners in cooler zones will need to either reseed every year or pot some up as houseplants, for the winter.
Height: 1 - 4 ft.
Width: 1 - 3 ft.
Hardiness Zone: USDA zones 7 - 11
Exposure: Full sun to partial shade
Giant Hyssop (Agastache rugosa)
These days there are many wonderful Hyssop cultivars to grow and experiment with in your garden, But the common Anise Hyssop ( Agastache foeniculum) and the Purple Giant Hyssop, being featured here, give you the strongest minty-licorice scent. The fragrance is mainly in the leaves, but Purple Giant Hyssop is also a long blooming perennial, with short, spiky lavender-purple flowers that start to bloom in midsummer and carry on to fall. You will have to share the flowers with the bees and pollinators, that find it irresistible.
Giant Purple Hyssop is very adaptable and can even handle high humidity better than most hyssop varieties. It makes a nice cut flower and a delicious minty tea.
Height: 1 - 3 ft.
Width: 1 - 3 ft.
Hardiness Zone: USDA zones5 - 9
Exposure: Full sun
Heliotrope (Heliotropium arborescens)
To really enjoy the rich vanilla scent of Heliotrope, you need to plant a good size clump of it. You won't be sorry you did. The flower clusters come in purple and white and sit atop dense, deep, green foliage. The plants are not tall, and make a nice front of the border plant, where you can really enjoy their fragrance.
They got the name Heliotrope, because they follow the sun, shifting their flower heads as the sun moves across the sky, like sunflowers. Plant them in a sunny location, because the heat helps them release their fragrance. Much like Valerian, some people pick up a hint of cherry along with the vanilla scent, which gives heliotrope the common name "the cherry pie plant".
Height: 18 - 24 inches
Width: 12 - 15 inches
Hardiness Zone: USDA zones 10 - 11
Exposure: Full sun to partial shade
Jasmine Tobacco ( Nicotiana alata)
The Nicotiana family may be best known for tobacco, but several of the other species are much more pleasant to inhale. Jasmine tobacco has a fragrance that resembles - you guessed it - jasmine. The star-shaped, tubular flowers tend to open in late afternoon. So many of the best fragrant plants bloom in the evening, when we're home and relaxing. The flowers sit atop tall, nodding stems and seem to glow in the fading light.
Jasmine tobacco doesn't usually start flowering until mid-summer, but then it goes until frost. Make sure you get plants labeled Nicotiana alata. There are many hybrid Nicotiana cultivars on sale today, but most have been bred for color or shape and no longer have any fragrance. What a pity.
Height: 3 - 4 ft.
Width: 15 - 18 inches
Hardiness Zone: USDA zones 10 - 11
Exposure: Full sun to partial shade
Pinks (Dianthus species)
There are many flowers in the Dianthus species. They are often all referred to as "Pinks", although the low growing variety is considered the true pink, if that matters. They all have some degree of sublime clove scent and the heirloom varieties are much more intense than newer introductions.
The plants supposedly got their name because of the serrated "pinked" edges of the petals. While Pinks do not have to be pink, some of the best are, including 'Cheddar Pink'
Sweet Alyssum (Lobularia maritima)
Sweet alyssum as been bred into tight, low mounds, but that wasn't always the case. Old-fashioned alyssum certainly isn't tall, but it has a more blowsy habit that makes it fit right into a cottage garden, while still making an excellent edging plant. It will spill over and soften edges, while it releases its honey-scented fragrance. Plant it in mass, for the best results.
taken from https://www.thespruce.com/deliciously-fragrant-heirloom-flowers-
till next time this is Becky Litterer, Becky's Greenhouse, Dougherty Iowa beckmall@netins.net
Sweetly Scented Flowers for Your Garden
Gardeners today are blessed with seemingly endless plant choices for their gardens. It's true, hundreds of new plants are introduced each year and many are just too tempting to resist. However most modern plants have been bred for color, size, shape, or some form of resistance. With the exception of David Austin's delicious roses, the one attribute overlooked is fragrance.
Fragrance is one of the first features to come to mind, when we think of flowers, yet it is often missing from gardens entirely. What would spring be without the enveloping perfume of lilacs? A rose just isn't a rose without scent and Sweet Autumn Clematis lets us know the season might be winding down, but the memory will linger.
One easy way to bring more fragrance back into your garden is with heirloom flowers, those old-fashioned open pollinated plants that were garden staples for years. The term heirloom generally refers to plants that are at least 50 years old and the seed has been passed down from gardener to gardener. Some come with stories or a provenance, but many are just old standards.
These older flowers are often taller than modern hybrids and sometimes a bit messier in growth habit - perfect for a cottage garden. Since they are open pollinated, most will reseed themselves throughout your borders and generally make themselves at home, without a lot of effort on your part.
Four O'Clock (Mirabilis jalapa)
The bright, cheerful flowers of Four O'Clocks often go unnoticed, because they don't open until late in the afternoon. However once they do, you are treated to an orange-scented aroma that wafts through the air. Plant them near your outdoor seating area and bask in this wonderful scent. The flowers remain open until morning and will even bloom during the day, if the weather is overcast.
Plants can be started by either tubers or seed. They can become a nuisance in warmer climates, but gardeners in cooler zones will need to either reseed every year or pot some up as houseplants, for the winter.
Height: 1 - 4 ft.
Width: 1 - 3 ft.
Hardiness Zone: USDA zones 7 - 11
Exposure: Full sun to partial shade
Giant Hyssop (Agastache rugosa)
These days there are many wonderful Hyssop cultivars to grow and experiment with in your garden, But the common Anise Hyssop ( Agastache foeniculum) and the Purple Giant Hyssop, being featured here, give you the strongest minty-licorice scent. The fragrance is mainly in the leaves, but Purple Giant Hyssop is also a long blooming perennial, with short, spiky lavender-purple flowers that start to bloom in midsummer and carry on to fall. You will have to share the flowers with the bees and pollinators, that find it irresistible.
Giant Purple Hyssop is very adaptable and can even handle high humidity better than most hyssop varieties. It makes a nice cut flower and a delicious minty tea.
Height: 1 - 3 ft.
Width: 1 - 3 ft.
Hardiness Zone: USDA zones5 - 9
Exposure: Full sun
Heliotrope (Heliotropium arborescens)
To really enjoy the rich vanilla scent of Heliotrope, you need to plant a good size clump of it. You won't be sorry you did. The flower clusters come in purple and white and sit atop dense, deep, green foliage. The plants are not tall, and make a nice front of the border plant, where you can really enjoy their fragrance.
They got the name Heliotrope, because they follow the sun, shifting their flower heads as the sun moves across the sky, like sunflowers. Plant them in a sunny location, because the heat helps them release their fragrance. Much like Valerian, some people pick up a hint of cherry along with the vanilla scent, which gives heliotrope the common name "the cherry pie plant".
Height: 18 - 24 inches
Width: 12 - 15 inches
Hardiness Zone: USDA zones 10 - 11
Exposure: Full sun to partial shade
Jasmine Tobacco ( Nicotiana alata)
The Nicotiana family may be best known for tobacco, but several of the other species are much more pleasant to inhale. Jasmine tobacco has a fragrance that resembles - you guessed it - jasmine. The star-shaped, tubular flowers tend to open in late afternoon. So many of the best fragrant plants bloom in the evening, when we're home and relaxing. The flowers sit atop tall, nodding stems and seem to glow in the fading light.
Jasmine tobacco doesn't usually start flowering until mid-summer, but then it goes until frost. Make sure you get plants labeled Nicotiana alata. There are many hybrid Nicotiana cultivars on sale today, but most have been bred for color or shape and no longer have any fragrance. What a pity.
Height: 3 - 4 ft.
Width: 15 - 18 inches
Hardiness Zone: USDA zones 10 - 11
Exposure: Full sun to partial shade
Pinks (Dianthus species)
There are many flowers in the Dianthus species. They are often all referred to as "Pinks", although the low growing variety is considered the true pink, if that matters. They all have some degree of sublime clove scent and the heirloom varieties are much more intense than newer introductions.
The plants supposedly got their name because of the serrated "pinked" edges of the petals. While Pinks do not have to be pink, some of the best are, including 'Cheddar Pink'
Sweet Alyssum (Lobularia maritima)
Sweet alyssum as been bred into tight, low mounds, but that wasn't always the case. Old-fashioned alyssum certainly isn't tall, but it has a more blowsy habit that makes it fit right into a cottage garden, while still making an excellent edging plant. It will spill over and soften edges, while it releases its honey-scented fragrance. Plant it in mass, for the best results.
taken from https://www.thespruce.com/deliciously-fragrant-heirloom-flowers-
till next time this is Becky Litterer, Becky's Greenhouse, Dougherty Iowa beckmall@netins.net
