Campanula mania, part 2

 This week I’d love to concentrate on campanulas that are usually considered to be border types. Not borderline – it’s just me being obsessed, not the plants – but for flower borders, obviously.

First, there is my absolute favourite, the one I really really do not want to be without and hence embarrassingly keep spending money on new plants, even though they should self-seed generously: Campanula persicifolia, the peach-leaved bellflower. As you will have guessed, I do not have a good spot for them and hence they do not self-seed – or, more precisely, the seedlings don’t stand a chance of coming up in my thicket of a “border” (they do self-seed in random pots nearby and the children’s sandpit though).

Also, I keep thinking of them as light woodland plants, their delicate graceful spires ravishingly beautiful in dappled shade, so keep planting them in the mostly shady beds around the terrace when in fact they love a fair bit of light. They do tolerate shade, but not to the extend I subject them to. So, rather than thrive, they grow weaker by the year, overshadowed and muscled out by their stronger neighbours. (That’s a constant theme on an epic scale in my garden, I’m afraid, as everything is far too densely planted – did I mention I’m a plant maniac in general, not just regarding campanulas?)

Campanula persicifolia - photo from www.plantify.co.uk

There may be a second reason why they grow weaker though: I simply exhaust them. As their flowering period is fairly fleeting and (as said before) campanulas do not wilt well aesthetically, I tend to pinch off spent blooms with fingernails or the above mentioned nail scissors. I know. Too much time or worse… This does have an advantage though: rather than setting seed and spending its energy to ripen it, the plant keeps producing more and more blooms from its axils. You can thus keep it going until late autumn if you so wish – but it comes at a price.

Even a single C. persicifolia glows in the shade

Wish there were more... I could never have enough

I usually buy the white form of Campanula persicifolia as it looks much better in a shady situation. But the blue – or, to be precise, lilac coloured – version is just as gorgeous and looks stunning with most roses, for instance. In fact, I think of this species as a companion to roses almost as much as I think of it as woodland glade plants. I remember seeing C. persicifolia used as such in this most romantic of rose gardens, Mottisfont (Hampshire, in the care of the National Trust).

Campanula persicifolia accompanying old roses at Mottisfont, Hampshire

However, to set off the National Collection of Old-fashioned roses there, they also deploy a similar but stiffer and coarser looking bellflower:  Campanula latiloba. There are lovely varieties such as ‘Highcliff’ and ‘Hidcote Amethyst’ – the former being darker, deeper in colour. I so far could just about refrain from buying those, thinking of my experience with other big border types, and hence can’t speak from own experience here. In general, however, this campanula has stronger upright spires with more starry, open flowers that do not have any individual stalks to speak of and thus do not “hang” but sit tightly on the main flower stem, making it appear like a huge ice-lolly.

This and the fact that Campanula latiloba grows in clumps (thus making a bigger splash of colour in one go) seems to predestine them for being used much like foxgloves or delphiniums: the knights with upright lances, standing guard over the queen of flowers. Although, it must be said, there are more of a gnomic type of guard when compared to the noble delphinium…

Much coarser and stiffer in appearance: C. latiloba

Certainly no gnome and – given the right care – just as tall as any delphinium however is Campanula pyramidalis. It also goes by the name of Chimney Bellflower since it used to be grown in pots and taken in for its flowering period in July and/ or August (so generally later than the previous two) to grace the then cold and empty chimney breasts.

I first came upon it thus displayed inside the twilight of the Great Hall in Great Dixter, the home of the late Christopher Lloyd, and was blown away: Three metres of purple-blue glowing stars stacked in – the clue is in the name – a tall, slender pyramid. One of those statement plants with a definite wow-effect! I had to have it! And I have had it ever since. I switched from the purple to the white version though, because the campanula-“blue” jarred so badly with the pots of true blue agapanthus blooming beside it. The white ones look magnificent though.

Campanula pyramidalis in Great Dixter - photo from www.greatdixter.co.uk

Mine do not grow to three metres; mainly, I guess because I do not much fertilize or fuzz over them and their pots are not all that big. But I have had two metres in their first year of flowering and more than a meter ever since. I do tend to repot into new soil every other year, though.

Also, the plant does not seem to know it is usually classed as a biennial but comes up again and again. (Dedicated plant books, of course, call it a short lived perennial.) In any way, it self-seeds like a weed and I have to be seriously at it because the seedlings muscle out any weaker plant in which pot they happen to germinate. I don’t mind. So far, I’ve always been able to find happy recipients for those seedlings.

One of the seedlings I gave away two years ago: given space and more soil, it looks much better than my own

Full of buds: It will look like a haze of stars in a few weeks time

As you will have guessed, I grow mine outside and do not bring them in for flowering. For one thing, they would not look well next to the many (sub-)tropic indoor plants I grow there. Secondly, there simply is no room as the "inmates" jostle for space already - though not quite as badly as the plants in my garden. Also, I simply love the campanulas' addition there. Bees and other pollinators think them the best buffet ever. There certainly is a constant buzz around them.

That, however, seems to have been the reason the late Christopher Lloyd did NOT like them much outdoors: according to the excellent book on campanulas by Lewis and Lynch I already quoted last week, he wrote: "The reason they are unsuccessful in the garden is because the bees pollinate their flowers, and these then fade in a matter of three days instead of three weeks."

He’s certainly right, of course, in that they last much longer inside – if you manage to keep insects out. But I find mine last longer than three days and don’t mind the bees having a sip. If they fade too quickly – well, there is the tried and tested method of the nail scissors, although even I have given up on that one with Campanula pyramidalis. (There are simply too many little stars!)

If you did want to grow them for indoors, Lewis & Lynch quote a Victorian reference that claims to produce flower stems up to five metres (16 feet) tall. Be warned though – they had enough time and personnel then to seriously fuzz over plants… Or, you could just take your 1.5 metres tall plant in a pot inside the minute the first flower opens and enjoy it as it is!

Campanula pyramidalis produces masses of flowers - photo from www.vwmin.org

I accidentally discovered another “use” for them last year. I had transplanted one seedling into my shady border, just to give it a try. A flower stalk grew – albeit only reaching height in November. I was disappointed, of course, for due to the temperature or short days in didn’t open any blooms and I thought winter would kill it off. Curious however, I let it stay – either for nature to take its course or perhaps it would get through somehow anyway. It did.

However, either because of stronger winds or in search of light it keeled over and grew all horizontally rather than upright. Not heaving the heart to kill it off now after it had made it through winter so bravely I still left it in place, despite the pitiful sight. And then the most extraordinary thing happened. At least extraordinary to my unsuspecting mind: From almost every node it grew a new, albeit shorter flower stalk! There must have been 15 to twenty of them – it looked like a slightly out of place white picket-fence when finally they were in full bloom! Which just goes to show that a) you shouldn’t be too tidy minded because b) nature more often than not will seriously surprise you and turn something bad into good.

One Campanula pyramidalis grown horizontally: nature's own picket fence

And here endeth the sermon. Not least because I have to be on the school run soon and this post is long enough already. But, as I have even more campanula species in my garden, I will write a third time about them next week. Now, don’t be struck down with enthusiasm! - - - What? Those spasms and convulsions were of horror rather than joy? Steady on. Readers to my blog so far can be counted on one hand – they have been warned now and can abstain next week. And if you happened to chance upon this sometime later, you can simply NOT click the next post J!