Lady Marmalade

Sometimes you just need the right lighting to really appreciate colorful foliage, although this little purple beauty won't go unnoticed through the summer when it competes for interest with the daisies and the crane's bills.

Another near miss in the battle with the mighty hellebores (I swear, they are bent on garden domination if left to their own devices), these exotic looking coral bells seem very happy in their new location in dappled shade.

Heucheras are advertised as shade plants but they will not bloom at all and will slowly diminish to nothingness in full shade, no matter how much care, food and water they get. What they like most is a location with slightly acidic soil where they receive no more than five hours of direct sunlight a day, preferably in the morning. The harsh heat of the summer afte
oons stresses them and even though they hold on to their water pretty well they will spend all their efforts protecting their moisture instead of blooming.

Some gardeners advise against growing heucheras in heavy soils but I noticed mine are thriving even though most of the soil in my garden is rock hard clay. Most plants don't mind the weight on their roots if they have plentiful nutrients, sufficient water and adequate sun exposure and use it to their advantage against being uprooted by strong winds. Heavy soils are usually more of a challenge for the gardener than for the garden.

The coral bell clumps grow slowly until they start hollowing out in the middle, giving you a hint that it's time to divide them. They are pretty old when that happens and if left untouched they die eventually, they are not very long lived plants. Young coral bells boom prolifically from May till August, depending on the cultivar, and are really stunning both as specimen plants and in mixed borders, although I noticed that you can either get spectacular foliage or beautiful flowers, not both. The cultivars with colorful leaves have rather unimpressive tiny white flowers.