Stuff Magazines

NORTHLAND

- Surprising magenta-coloured blooms spring into action this season.

These exquisite little flowers are the Chinese ground orchid (Bletilla striata). They are less than 20mm across and they unfold sequentially up a stem spike that emerges from a clump of pleated leaves (hence the name striata, meaning striated or furrowed). The spring flowering is a standout lasting less than a month on plants that otherwise draw little attention to themselves.

Although they look delicate, these little ladies are tough and are one of the easiest orchids to grow because they’re from temperate lands, are deciduous, and as their name suggests, they grow in the ground rather than perched up in trees like their more tropical cousins. Native to China, Japan, Korea and Myanmar, they would be happy in most New Zealand gardens provided their leaves and flower stems are protected from late or intense frosts. The corms sit just under the ground and are OK down to about -4°C, so plant in pots if somewhere that gets colder than that.

Several pleated spear-shaped leaves sprout afresh from each corm in spring and almost every new shoot has a flower spike with several blooms. The plant reaches about knee high, and the corms clump out more each year so will gradually spread and increase flower spike numbers filling an understorey area. The ones here are a gorgeous magenta but colours vary from white to purple and blue.

When the flowering is over, the stems form attractive ribbed seedpods which look great picked and bunched to dry, and the plant’s distinctive pleated leaves add interest over summer.

Ground orchids then look scrappy in autumn and die away for winter, so prune off remaining foliage or stems to tidy them up and to encourage fresh spring shoots. Clumping corms can also jump outside designated garden edges so dig up any strays in the winter and transplant them.

Ground orchids are happiest in a semi-shaded, almost woodland environment and the ones up here are in front of a low hedge under trees, away from intense summer sun.

They get no special treatment but are in free-draining soil at the top of a hill, and get the occasional sprinkler watering in our dry summers. They don’t like sodden ground especially when they’re dormant.

The Bletilla genus name is in honour of an 18th century Spanish apothecary named Luis Blet. In their Asian homeland, Bletilla striata were used in traditional medicine, and also as a natural glue for making silk strings for traditional Chinese instruments.

In the same garden is another magenta treasure that blooms a few weeks later but lasts for months. It’s been tricky to identify but I’ve discovered that it’s a bleeding heart vine (Clerodendrum thomsoniae ‘Delectum’). The confusion is in both the “bleeding heart” and the “vine” bit, and I’ve never seen it anywhere else. This gorgeous plant looks different from the common bleeding heart (Dicentra spectabilis) and belongs to a different plant family, and the specimen in my friend’s garden is years old but remains less than a metre high so doesn’t seem like a vine.

This beauty gets absolutely smothered in clusters of magenta blooms that emerge out of puffy papery pink calyxes in early summer. The flowers themselves last a few weeks and then the pink calyx husks continue to clothe the plant for most of the summer. All this is set against lush crinkled leaves supported on striking black stems.

Every description of this plant, including its name, suggest the bleeding heart vine is a climber that spreads for several metres, but this local specimen doesn’t. Apparently though, if it’s in a container with restricted roots it will remain much smaller and bushier. Our local plant happens to be on a sun-facing bank surrounded by huge basalt rocks so its roots are probably confined in a way similar to being it a pot. Mystery solved. Flowering is on new growth, and the deadheads and any shoots are pruned back a bit each winter after flowering, but there is no sense of having to restrain climbing action.

Clerodendrum thomsoniae are native to tropical west Africa, so the basalt rocks here must also act as a heat sink, which explains how this stunner is comfortable outside in our subtropical climate. In its homeland, the plant is evergreen but in cooler temperatures, including here, there’s a short time when it looks not quite dormant but definitely sad and sleeping.

Clerodendrums need direct sun in order to bloom well and rich, free-draining soil both of which our local plant has, but it doesn’t get much of the prescribed regular water in our dry summers and still continues to thrive. This stunning plant is supposed to be easy to strike from cuttings, so this year I’ve put lots in pots to find out.

In the first days of spring, a row of nodding magenta flowerheads come out to play in a friend’s garden.

CONTENTS

en-nz

2021-09-01T07:00:00.0000000Z

2021-09-01T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://stuffmagazines.pressreader.com/article/283042647596843

Stuff Limited