Ruud Kleinpaste: Plants to brighten up the dark, cool months in the garden

The next few months we’ll be “in the dark” so to speak – the shortest days of the year puts us in front of the Low Emissions Burner, keeping warm while reading gardening magazines.  

What kinds of plants give us colour at this time?  

Go and visit your local Botanic Garden and take a note book with you – I often look at the stuff that Julie plants at our place. 

Tree Dahlia are huge plants that can grow up to 4 or 5 meters tall. They are true Dahlias, just a bit taller than your ordinary varieties.  

Their contrast with blue autumn and winter skies is remarkable. Easy to grow and easy to prune after flowering. They simply grow another lot of branches next autumn!  

Nerines are currently spectacular. Bright pink flowers delivered by a bulbous plant. Seeing we’re in rather frost-free part of the Port Hills, they keep on flowering. They belong to the Amaryllidaceae (bulbs) and don’t care about soil quality as long as it isn’t too wet. Easy to transplant.   

Salvia leucantha (Mexican Bush Sage). Works well in full sun with well-drained soil and flowers up to a meter high even at this time of the year, visited by hordes of pollinators – especially Bumblebee Queens. 

Smoke Bush (Cotinus species) is an oldy but a goody. Many different varieties and colours, especially in the purple range (Royal Purple, “Grace” etc) but also in lime green or red. Flowers look like smoky patches, but right now smoke bush is a variable painting of artistic colours. 

Liquidambar leaves light up the lawn. Those autumn leaves can come in a wide variety of colours, creating patches of oranges, yellows, and purple. Leave them where they are! Birds will attempt to find food under those leaves (worms and hibernating insects) and when those leaves have slowly decayed, you can put them in the compost bin: free Nitrogen. 

We have a Eucalyptus tree that flowers profusely right now. No idea what species it is but the Tui and Bellbird, silver eye and bumblebees, winter moths and nectivorous flies, as well as huge Gum Emperor moths (in summer) love this tree for all its gorgeousness. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack Tame podcast
from News Talks at be.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
Road Climb Pass.

Speaker 3 (00:14):
Good morning, A very good morning to you, Francesca. How
are you going.

Speaker 2 (00:18):
I'm really good, Thank you. I love your topic today.
You're just going to talk about, you know, as we're
heading to the shortest day of the year, we can
just put a little bit of color and liven up
the garden a little bit.

Speaker 3 (00:30):
Yeah. I think people don't always think about that. They go, oh,
it's winter or whatever, which is not until the twenty
first of May or June, of course, but that's another story.
But no, the point is that I always love going
to the botanic gardens or actually just walking around my
garden because my Julie is a bit of a gardener

(00:52):
and she has all sorts of lovely stuff there that
is actually flowering now, like such as I'll give you
an example, three dahlias, do you know, tree daily dahlia
They go they go tall, don't they absolutely, like four
or five meters and then against the blue sky that

(01:13):
exactly against the blue sky that we have at the
moment in Canterbury, it looks gorgeous. It's that pinky pinky color,
and it is absolutely stunning. And you know what, this
is the thing. You don't really need to do much
with them. You can prune them if you like. They'll
grow back up to the same height next year, no
hassles at all. So that's I think that's that's one

(01:34):
of my favorites too. Nereenes is another one. Julie has
a shiverst load of nereenes in the garden. Bright pink.
It's well, you know, I'm not pink is not me
really my color, but boy, it is spectacular. It's beautiful.
It's really nice. And here in the porthills where we
don't have frost that often or actually at all, almost

(01:57):
and you can grow these things still at least May
June July no problem. And after that, and especially when
it's not too wet, you can enternd plant them and
deal with them what you like. And they're not so easy.

Speaker 2 (02:09):
They're not too fussy about your soil quality either, are they.

Speaker 3 (02:12):
No, they have the crappiest soils in the world. As
long as it drains. This is amazing. So and they've
got selvia that is a Mexican bush, say Selvia leucantha,
and that really works well in the sun as well,
and it flowers up to a meter high. It's beautiful.
But here comes the thing. There are still bumblebees pollinating

(02:34):
those flowers, and there are not one or two, there
are dozens of them. And to me that shows you
that that means those bumblebees will be fine for next
year when they come out as fertilized queens. Is that
a safety or not? Yeah? No, not a no no,
you don't no, no, no. I don't think you would
keep that. It might have a nice smell, I suppose,

(02:57):
and you might be able to use it as a
bit of a yeah, a bit of a on flavor,
but I'm not one hundred percent sure. I wouldn't do
it until you've worked it out. I don't know, Okay,
I don't think so. Smoke bushes this is another one.
It's that's actually I've just been reading up on that.
That's something that they've used for a long long time

(03:19):
in gardens, and there are so many different species. We've
got the purple range like the Royal purple and grace,
but there's now also lime green ones and this is
the time when they leave. They're not kind of falling
off yet, but they are doing these autumn color gigs
and they will be like that color for another at

(03:39):
least two months. So that is really really nice to
have in the book at the bottom of your garden
as well. And yeah, and then let's go to some
trees by the way, liquid amber. You know that one. Yeah,
always good autumn leaves, isn't it. And they take their
time to do it, which is really cool. And I'm

(04:01):
using it especially with birds around lots of food food
under the leaves that falling. So when I do bird bending,
like what I'm doing right now with some guys that
I'm teaching, you'll find that if those leaves fall on
the ground, underneath those leaves, you will find all the
food that birds need. And it is lovely and it
is colorful. And then finally that eucalyptus you've seen that

(04:25):
picture there, Yes, beautiful, Yeah, yeah, not only that it
has in the summertime, it's got these amazing gum emperor
moth caterpillars four inches long, violent green with red and
orange dots and blue spatters and prickly things on their back.

(04:45):
Just amazing. But now Belbert Dewey Khaka, everything in the
neighborhood comes and gets the eucalyptus flowers. Now you wake
up for that, wouldn't you?

Speaker 2 (04:56):
I certainly would, Thank you so much. Rood has some
lovely ideas there. Nice to talk to you.

Speaker 1 (05:04):
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