We love seeing this False Hellebore when we are hiking up to Marmot Pass or Mt Townsend in the Olympics.  Always growing in dappled light or partly sunny spts where there is ample moisture, the big wide pleated leaves are perfect with the drooping plume-like green flowers.  Deer proof.

A no-fuss restrained yet refined evergreen Cardamine which is nearly faultless.  We haven't found a fault yet but most overachievers are hiding something deep under that charm and industry.  Rest assured, this will never go postal in your garden.  Dark green dense leaves set off  flowers of of purest white in early summer.

We received this as the Pioneer Mountain form of Erythronium revolutum and indeed, there is revolutum in them as well as californicum.  These are obviously natural hybrids which do occur and perusing "Erythroniums in Cultivation" by Ian Young, these fit his description nicely especially with the parallel, narrow filaments.

Maidenhair Spleenwort.  I love common names.  I must dig out our 15th century Herbal and read up on how to properly decoct this sweet little fern for afflicting humors of the spleen.  Or I can just grow it in a gritty well-drained shaded rock garden and enjoy its evergreen delicacy.

Much like the famed chicken, this hybrid from Ed Bowen is destined to become a staple.  But in our gardens rather than our tables.  Ed crossed the giant of the genus, Eucomis autumnalis ssp. pole-evansii with E. 'Sparkling Burgundy' and got the pineapple lily of our dreams with big rich foliage and flowers.

Rare plant found only in limited areas in central Honshu, Japan where it likes the forest fringes in the subalpine areas and is known as hiiragi-sou or holly tree-leafed weed.  Hiiragi-sou sounds better than the translation.  This selection has dark blue flowers and is a deciduous clumper to 16" tall - very nice!

Alpine Water Fern. Found at higher elevations in Australia's New South Wales and Tasmania growing in grasslands, moist rock crevices and sphagnum bogs. A stalwart fern and go-to evergreen low groundcover because it looks great despite your prolonged attention lapses from pandemic Netflix binge-watching.

Solomon's Seal.  Mighty fine selection and surely one of the very best variegated perennials for shade.  Good clean white variegation that illuminates where it is planted.  Stunning enough to stand alone with a simple groundcover at its feet or schmoozes easily  with other garden glitteratti.

These hardy orchids seed around the nursery which is a very good thing as we have never got one to come up from seed we have intentionally planted. This will be pink to purple but sometimes a white one sneaks in. This is basically a bulb that goes summer dormant but appreciates ample moisture when growing.  Likely some species like fuchsii may also be an option here in this Lucky Dip.

Frosted Jade Ajuga.  Hard to believe that this is an Ajuga but it is true.  This choice selection has fantastic foliage and very good dark cobalt flowers.  Not a spreader - this makes a clump with 16" tall stems.  Challenges all of your comfy notions about Ajuga but in a good way.  Great in our shade garden.

If you have the spot for this plant then there is no reason to not to grow this unless you simply don't do red because this is a smoldering fountain of saturated pigmentation celebrating the red spectrum.  Red foliage and bright red flowers on 3'-4' stems in late summer.  Moist and rich.

Staggeringly impressive recent introduction of this Solomon Seal species from - wait for it -  Vietnam.  This is similar to our favorite Polygonatum huanum (formerly as kingianum) but is just more of everything that is good.  Large red flowers snug the whorled leaves on stems which this year in the garden reached 15' tall and which remain green for us until temps drop below 20F.

These are seed-grown from our plant of 'Hakure' which is often seen as 'Hakuree'.  The parent plant was bred and selected by Hiroshi Hayakama in Japan in the early 90's who chose this for its floriferous display of white flowers just touched with fleeting lavender and sporting twisted tepals.  Our seed-grown progeny will vary from deep purple to white but all will be good. 18"-30" tall.

This rugged South African is sun, wind and drought tolerant and absolutely hardy in the PNW.  One of the most admired plants in our border for its profuse display of large yellow to orange daisies on low stems.  Good drainage.

A very good form of the species collected by Dan Hinkley in China.  All parts - leaves, scape or flower stem, flowers - larger than typically found in the species.  Fresh grass green leaves are marked in silver and the flower stems bears a snowstorm of simple white flowers This will thrive in the moist shade garden but prefers light to bright shade.

A bushy hardy Fuchsia with arching branches and largish leaves which is good because they are one of the good things about this selection being richly colored in red if grown in ample sun.  The flowers are no slouch either and they have to bring it to keep up with the leaves and that they do with a red exterior and a double purple interior corolla.  Winter mulch.

We received this extraordinary selection from and equally extraordinary plantsman, David Mason of the vaunted former Hedgerows Nursery.  Few members of the genus approach this for impact which is only heightened by flowering before other large-flowered forms.   The emerging spring growth is enclosed in soft salmon sheaths and the hot damn lavender-pink flowers stand proud before the leaves develop.

Lily of the Valley.  A good selection of this stalwart species with a yellow margin to the leaves and said leaves are larger than average as well.  Typical scented white flowers.  There are numerous spellings of the cultivar name but since this is an American introduction, we can only assume this is correct.  Sad.

Beautiful clumping species that may well be the queen of the genus.  Or are we granting royalty because it is new on the scene?  Maybe, but it is awfully good. This makes a stout small clump of evergreen fern-like leaves from which emerge in spring the peculiarly Coptis greenish-yellow flowers.  From China.

A purported G. papilio hybrid, our mama plant when in bloom with its 5 foot stems of red-mauve flowers sporting dark eye patches, frequently caused plant geeks to start speaking in tongues and offer creative enticements in exchange for a wee bit.  We have had to say "No." until now.

Kind of a rocking plant in that it really requires nothing from you.  We have it in a drier spot in our shade garden and it just trucks along looking good and putting on nice white flowers for months on end.  Horrible winter weather comes and it doesn't care - just stays evergreen.  We've gotten rather attached to it and you will as well.  One of Beth Chatto's 100 favorites.

Long my favorite Bergenia with large upright broad paddles of leaves which turn the  best maroon in the winter of any in the genus.  Oh sure, the dark pink flowers are good in spring but this plant is one of the few reasons I look forward to winter.  Galanthus for contrast - oh my.

Pretty awesome new hybrid that came up at Suncrest Nurseries in CA thanks to some inspired work by the bees.  This outshines its parents with gray-blue leaves and branched erect stems to 3' holding lots of lavender-blue flowers for many weeks.  This can take drier conditions and the vermin deer don't like it.

An interesting Asian Lysimachia which we have not yet identified.  These genus is widespread and varied in Asia with over 170 species and varieties in China alone.  It is so much easier to key out monotypic genera where there is but a single species.  This is from lower elevations and we have not trialed it outside yet but looks frost sensitive.

Yellow Jacob's Ladder. A nice unexpected departure from the usual blue flowers of Polemonium as these are yellow with lacquered tomato. This little flowering powerhouse hails from the Southwest and northern Mexico and can put all it has to give into the many flowers so save seed and you can let it self-sow.

This is thought to be an intergeneric hybrid between 2 of New Zealand's shrubby daisies.  This gives a fabulous textural addition to the Mediterranean garden like some happy marriage of heather and rosemary.  Small white flowers cluster at the tops of the stems.  Good drainage, tolerant of some dry.

A surprisingly hardy tuberous little wildflower from the mountains of the Southwest.  This has BLUE flowers of some enviable intensity.  The flower buds are held clasped in a pouch like a heart folded in half and one flower emerges each day.  Sun, dry to moist and decent drainage.

Awesome little plant with fresh winter foliage which gives way to 8"-12" tall dense stems with an improbable number of pure white double flowers. Goes summer dormant so don't panic although we still do. Cool plant native to the UK and Europe and favoring vernally wet areas.

A mat-forming, creeping bit of amusement from New Zealand where it grows from Auckland south.  This is related to the monster Gunnera of cast concrete leaf fame but is just a tad more manageable.  Great at pond's edge in the shaded woodland and small pipecleaners of reddish flowers are a pleasant surprise.

Lovely, lovely species with classic Turk's cap shaped flowers of gentle pink with a lavender nuance further enhanced by a sprinkle of darker beauty spots on the downturned face which exhales a light fragrance that takes but the slightest stirring of the air to swirl about in fleeting notes taking this to yet a higher plane of pleasure.  Seed grown