Re: Hellebore popularity

Hi Nan,

If you showed up one day in the Friday class at the LA County Arboretum you
would not believe hellebores are unpopular. Most avid gardeners love them!
    Why?
        1. Really good shade plant, adding an unusual hand-like leaf form to
the texture of plantings.
        2.  Can take a wide variety of sun to shade situations - the
Mediterranean ones can take really deep, deep shade as well as sun.
        3.  Mediterranean ones (and their hybrid, Ivory Prince) are fairly
drought tolerant - but not completely!
        4.   Bloom in the winter when you can really appreciate them.
        5.  Fairly long lived, leaving volunteer seedlings when they do
croak.
        6.  At least the Helleborus hybridus are good container plants -
Medits get too big.
        7.  New "Royal Heritage" hybrids offer a wide range of bloom color.

THE ONE REASON THEY ARE PASSED BY AT THE NURSERY: because they are slow
growing and propagated by seed, they are more expensive than other plants.

All best,  Jan
(I decided to post this to the whole list)


On 7/25/06 10:40 AM, nsterman@PlantSoup.Com wrote

> Hiya
> 
> I just sent this question to the medit list so you are likely to see
> it twice -
> 
> I am wondering about hellebore.  Why do they seem to have such
> limited popularity in our gardens?  Is it true up and down the state
> or just here in the south?
> 
> XX
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