Seed heads
I have been enjoying the frosts in my garden, which overnight transform my rather sorry-looking borders into something completely magical. Everything comes to life, shapes and forms highlighted in sparkling iciness, colours in muted tones of pewter, silver and gold. The fronds of Stipa gigantea, dwindling and collapsing now, suddenly appear again as the frost outlines their filigree flower heads, and the ammi, recessive to the point of invisibility in the border before the frost descends, stand out like bright white ice sculptures against a tangle of dark stems. I have plenty of evergreen structure in my garden with shrubs like the grey-blue Teucrium fruticans and fresh green Hebe salicifolia clipped into loose domes. Against this structure is set the chaos of the seed heads and collapsing grasses, and now is the best time to see and assess which plants stand up to the winter weather. The seed heads come in all shapes and sizes, and it’s the mixture of forms that I want.
COW PARSLEYS: Ammi majus is an annual that self seeds in my garden. It’s not always the most robust in seed, and some will collapse before Christmas and be cleared away. But I always try and leave some in the borders just knowing that their seed heads will make me smile whenever there is a good frost. Another similar seed head comes from the perennial Cenolophium denudatum, an altogether more robust plant that has strong, brown seed heads that are guaranteed to last all winter. It is easy to grow from seed.
PLATES AND DOMES: The sedums (Autumn Joy) also hold strong in winter, their rich dark brown seed heads catching the frost which makes them look almost cauliflower-like. Hydrangea Annabelle has a similar domed, puffy shape, only taller and airier and blonde rather than brunette.
POM POMS: One of the best of all seed heads is Phlomis russeliana. Pale yellow and recessive in flower, it comes into its own in seed, with dark, chocolate-brown seed heads that are formed in pom pom whorls up the stem. Another good player in my garden is Monarda Kardinal, which goes through a stage of looking scrappy before its leaves disappear, leaving strong, upright stems topped with ping pong ball seed heads.
SPIRES: The tall, upright seed heads are important for vertical accents. In my garden the strongest and longest lasting spire is Verbascum chaixii Album, which is a short-lived perennial. It self seeds in my garden so it designs itself in the border, weaving itself around wherever there are gaps. Foxgloves can be good in seed too but the biennials that have flowered earlier in the season tend to collapse before winter starts in earnest. The seed heads of the perennial foxgloves Digitalis grandiflora and D. parviflora are longer lasting; grandiflora has small, airily-spaced, nut-brown pods up the stems, while parviflora has stouter, sturdier and closer-packed seed pods.
BUTTONS AND STARS: In the back border, the asters provide great big billows of small, starry seed heads that catch the frost beautifully in polka-dot clouds. The names of the asters have changed: I have Symphiotrichum turbinellum (small purple daisies) and the taller white and unpronounceable Doellingeria umbellata. Verbena bonariensis is still hanging around too, and won’t get cut back until February or March. And finally I won’t forget the dark buttony seed heads of Rudbeckia Goldsturm, which stand out like black eyes against the pale fronds of Stipa tenuissima.
