I have found it much easier to come up with shots for the Foliage Follow Up post this month than the Garden Blogger Bloom Day post. I love foliage and I think it really comes into its own at this time of year. A favorite since childhood is Stachys byzantina, or as we called it when I was little, Lambs Ear.
Sticking to the gray tones there is Pulmonaria which has been self seeding around the garden for some years. I’m not that keen on the flowers but the leaves are a lovely foil to spring bulbs and you often get different variation. I am sure I heard someone say that if you cut the leaves back, as you would a geranium, after flowering you got a better plant so I might give this a go.
The everyday Digitalis purpurea has also started to self-seed around the garden and I think it has quite a structural presence in the garden.
I like Bergenias which I know isn’t a view shared by all gardeners. I think their glossy foliage is excellent at this time of year especially those varieties which color up for Autumn. They are one of those plants that just get on with it and then when everything else has given up for the year you notice them.
One more self-sower is the Arum italicum ‘Marmoratum’. They do produce flowers but it is the foliage and the seedheads in the Autumn.
For more foliage posts from around the world visit Pam over at Digging
