Named by plant guru John Flintoff who found this as an interesting seedling growing in plantswoman Loie Benedict's garden. Light green leaves with a spreading habit and flowers of a soft muted lavender which happily goes with most everything. As long as the soil is reasonably moist, this will be good in sun to light shade and is resistant to deer and rabbits.

From Sichuan where this was growing in an open position in a lightly shaded glade at about 10000' in elevation.  This has small leaves shaped much like a pointed canoe paddle with flower stems to 10"-15" tall bearing small round heads of white flowers sometimes with a diffused pink keel to the outer petals as many in this collection do.

Here is a little Japanese bulbous plant that will add some late summer glitz to the rock garden or special foreground planting niche.  Not shy about blooming, this will strut its stuff with round purplish flowerheads on 10" stems which sends our friends the Butterflies and Bees into quiet delirium.

A Dan Hinkley collection from Japan of this fine mid to late summer blooming Allium species.  Good richly colored purple flowers are freely produced on this densely clumping little dude.  Good in containers and great in the rock garden or special little niche.

Saskatoon Berry.  Selected for flavorful fruit, Smokey doubles as both an edible and an ornamental plus it is a native.  A fine small tree to just 12' or so with spring white flowers, dark raisiny fruit and good fall color.  Sure the deer eat it and of course the birds like the fruit so enjoy the wildlife and go buy a mango.

Bog Rosemary. This is a compact selection to just 6" tall and spreading with the gray-green needle-like leaves often taking on a red edge.  The short stems are hung with small pink bells in late spring which are enjoyed by bees.  Related to Rhododendrons and Heather, this likes a moist acidic spot in part sun.  Very hardy to zone 3.

A necessary part of the woodland garden are the small European Anemones and this is one of the good ones.  Fine foliage and nice white flowers in spring on a slowly spreading rhizomatous little bulbous plant.  As you may have surmised, this is at home in the Apennines in Italy and into Croatia.

A lovely form we brought home from Scotland a few years back.  This varies from the norm of mid-blue flowers by embracing the blending nature.of Impressionist pastels with its goes-with-anything non-confrontational light lavender-blue flowers in April and May.  Not surprisingly, this form is a Libra.

Choice selection of the Wood Anemone with flowers densely packed with numerous small white petals which appear all white at first but as the flowers mature or awaken, a central blue eye is revealed which is quite delightful.  I go through a similar slow process every morning and tell myself that it is the same delightful end result.

Wood Anemone.  This selection has funny heads of flowers where the petals have become dense clusters dissected white leafy bracts or did the bracts become dense bunches of filigreed snowflake petals?  Either way, quite a piece of floral artwork that garners ample attention.  Great for shade.

Wood Anemone.  This is a good blue form with flowers darker than many of the blue selections and even though the individual flowers are a little smaller than typical, we don't care as this is such a lovely thing.  Found in the Estonian woodlands by Mart Veerus and introduced we think by Janis Ruksans.

A nice small flowered light pink form of this necessary Anemone species which followed us home from the UK a few years back.  What is a necessary Anemone, you ask?  One which is indispensable in your shade or woodland garden and whose absence would not only be noted but commented upon and repeated, a gardening gaffe going viral.

Very sweet little Asian creeper for the woodland or partly sunny garden bed.  This form with its small white and fully double flowers is very appealing and the flowers are nicely in scale with the diminutive leaves.  A nice alternative to the European Anemone nemorosa clan and can be used in much the same way.

Very sweet little Asian creeper for the woodland or partly sunny garden bed.  This form with its small white and fully double flowers is very appealing and the flowers are nicely in scale with the diminutive leaves.  A nice alternative to the European Anemone nemorosa clan and can be used in much the same way.

A European species distinguished in part from Anemone nemorosa by its simple, unlobed leaves and white flowers bearing white or pale blue anthers,  This clone is white on white with a small green central button of the Divine Feminine business parts - altogether a pleasing pairing in the shade garden.  Thanks to plantsman Reuben Hatch for sharing this with us.

A new Japanese selection of a favorite eastern US wildflower. This has double white flowers which are quite large and are not the domed buttons of say 'Oscar Shoaf' but more of a flattened button with a thick frill of petals. This will bloom for many weeks on an established clump. These are divisions from our plants and very choice.

Very new selection out of Japan that is like a slightly less tight and paler 'Cameo'. These are surprisingly tough tuberous perennials native to the eastern US and will go summer dormant but before that happens, you will enjoy many weeks of long-lasting double flowers on an eventual impressive-for-its size clump.

Our native Columbine from seed collected on the way up to Mt Townsend in the Olympics.  One of our most endearing natives with pendulous flowers which have reddish petals and spurs backing a soft yellow cup.  This has a grace and charm so lacking in the garden hybrids.  One of the first wildflowers I learned tottering around in the woods.

Showy Milkweed.  Feed the Monarch butterflies!  This is the preferred species of Milkweed for the colorful caterpillars to feed on and having these flamboyant critters with their white-black-yellow rings crawling about the gray-green foliage is over-the-top ornamentation plus you get to chalk one up for the environment.

A very dwarf and often hard to find Astilbe that couples congested dark green foliage which is reddish bronze when in new growth with stout little spires of pink flowers.  Don't be mislead by its small stature into thinking this is some ephemeral dainty - it is tough and durable.

Masterwort.  Long-blooming compact variety with lots of long-lasting pincushion white flowers tinged variously in light pink.  The pink is most pronounced of the reverse of the bracts surrounding the button of "true" flowers which gives this a teasing bicolor look.  Astrantias give back way more than you put into them which works out really well.

A hybrid Bergenia from the breeding work of Rosemarie Eskuche in Germany.  'David' has smallish leaves which stand quite upright taking on good color in the winter.  Being smaller and upright lends itself to containers or the rock garden.  Intense pink flowers on stems to 16" in spring are impossible to ignore unless of course you decorate with plastic flamingos.

This Campanula was collected in Russia at Karachayevo-Cherkessiya, Terbeda, Gonachkir Valley at 1800 meters so next time you are there, keep an eye peeled for it.  This potentially can reach 3'-5' tall in flower with nice heads of pale lavender to white flowers in midsummer.  Is it hardy, you ask?  Da!

Heartleaf Bittercress. A western US and BC native which prefers the proximity of streams, springs or seeps and this one is an Alex Wright collection from Swauk Creek in Kittitas Co., WA.  Loves a rich moist soil where it will form dense colonies with flower stems holding white flowers with a cream eye 18"-36" high.  This was formerly the subspecies lyallii but has been lumped.into the species.

Lovely species in the group formerly placed in the genus Dentaria referring to their crinkled molar-like rhizomes.  We do enjoy the the color of the purple-pink flowers in early spring but there is a quality of texture and sheen to the leaves that makes us consistently murmur  'I like that plant" whenever we pass by it.

This will slowly make a very rewarding clump in the shade garden with 5-fingered leaves which spawned the species name of pentaphyllos. Good display of dark pink flowers in spring that blends well with many of the Anemone nemorosa varieties and frankly just about everything else in the shade garden. Native to Europe. Quite hardy.

One of those spring ephemerals we totally groove on.  This tuberous Toothwort is native to the woodlands of the former Yugoslavia so current geography is from Bosnia through Croatia and into stable Austria.  This will form a little colony but is not annoying in the least and is so delightful with its sizable white flowers in March.

An older cultivar introduced in 1948 by Walter Clarke of Clarke Nurseries in San Jose who was blazing new trails in breeding Chaenomeles by crossing C. cathayensis and the hybrid x superba.with the resulting crosses called x californica and then he just had to name one 'California'.  This has showy pink and rose-pink flowers.

A Ron Ratko collection of this shrubby gem that flies under everyone's radar.  Native to ID, OR and the SW, we saw this in the White Mts growing with the ancient Bristlecone Pines.  Like a shrubby Spiraea but with white Potentilla-like flowers highlighted by yellow anthers.  Lacy moth antennae leaves.  Dry and well-drained.

What is it about these small flowered Clems that tug at our hearts so?  Violet urns with recurved tips of very thick substance are like a rich necklace of amethyst laid upon the leaves and you are whisked to a lavish lobby dressed to the nines with champagne flute in hand and the orchestra is faintly tuning.  Lovely thing to dress a large shrub.