Between rain showers, I snapped a few photos of the Erigeron, or Mexican fleabane, that has suddenly burst into flower in our front garden. I find the flowers of this wiry plant rather cheerful as I approach the house, especially on rainy days like today. Daisy-like in appearance, the petals start out pale pink and become white as they mature with bright yellow centres. As the season goes on, these flowers will again become pink, even close to magenta, in colour.
Not native, but branded with the 'plants for pollinators' logo by the RHS, I find this plant a good nectar stop-gap. It will flower almost continuously from now until autumn, providing nectar for a range of insects. The type of insect I see visiting most often is hoverflies, but I have also seen small bees use the flowers too.
This particular variety is supposed to only grow to a height of 20 cm and spread of 45 cm, but this plant has already exceeded these measurements. It is recommended to cut Erigeron back to ground level in autumn, but I never have with this one, and it still seems quite happy.
References:
https://www.rhs.org.uk/plants/32487/Erigeron-karvinskianus/Details (accessed 30/04/2020)
No comments:
Post a Comment