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What are Perennial Plants?
A perennial plant lives for three plus years. Trees and shrubs are woody perennials.
In everyday garden use, perennial refers to herbaceous (non-woody) perennial plants.
A perennial plant lives for three plus years. Trees and shrubs are woody perennials.
But in everyday garden use, perennial refers to herbaceous (non-woody) perennial plants.
These produce new, non-woody growth from ground level every Spring and die back in Winter; in some cases, attractive dead stalks are kept for late season interest.
Evergreen herbaceous perennials are also non-woody, but they are always in leaf; their flower stalks die back each year.
Dahlias are “proper” herbaceous perennials but unlike any other perennial we sell, they are frost tender. Bulbs are herbaceous perennials too, but mostly flower in early Spring and have died back by the main perennial flower displays in Summer, Alliums being the late flowering and tall exception.
The perennial plant’s cycle repeats annually, and the plant has a life expectancy of never less than three years: typically longer, but even if it’s only 3-5 years, that’s a “short-lived perennial”.
Annual or biennial flowers are properly called bedding, but people often lump annuals and perennials together when discussing “soft plants that fill borders in Summer and don’t in Winter”.
Using perennial plants in your garden
The joy of perennials is their mostly undemanding nature, thriving in any well drained soil with more than half a day of sun.
Bit of tidying in Autumn, some feeding and watering in the growing season, and not much weeding because they cover the soil so well. Lovely.
A garden designer in the pub once said:
“A formal border is mostly shrubs with a few choice perennials and bedding plants.
The White Hart Arboricultural Institute, Castle Cary. Guest Ales and Karaoke
An informal cottage-y border is the opposite: mostly perennials and bedding plants with a few choice shrubs.
All shrubs is a car park, and all perennials and bedding plants looks sad about half the year.”
- Most perennials are grown for their flowers, some for their foliage, but they are all hard-working plants that fill your borders & patio containers with colour and texture.
- Most are hardy, some appreciate the protection of hay or mulch to insulate them in winter.
- They mostly flower from late Spring through Summer, some into Autumn, even until the frosts. attracting all your local bees and butterflies.
We grow tried and tested favourites, and new varieties. Our top quality, disease-free plants are grown in pots that are increasingly recyclable, and we use peat-free compost whenever possible.