'Willpower & sheer idiocy combine in harmony'
The dreaming spires of foxgloves
The shorter they are, the longer they last - in the case of foxgloves
MY investment in a packet of rare and mixed foxglove seeds in 2013 for less than £2 paid dividends.
The garden in 2014 was full of a variety of floral spires, reaching from 2ft to more than 6ft. The majority are shades of pink, but there's also many whites and a beautiful delicate apricot.
Unfortunately, although many self-seeded, or were perennial, the tallest and most unusual colours didn't reproduce/live.
Foxgloves really come into the own in late May/early June, at a point where there always seems to be a bit of a lull.
The bulbs have finished and early spring bedding like wallflowers and pansies are ragged and past their best.
Liking a bit of shade
They're also shade lovers, so I let them freely self-seed around the hedge boundaries.
They do well in pots (anywhere really). I have lots in tubs with tulips - the bulbs fade, then the foxgloves take over the flowering mantle.
I like mine best with a combination of cow parsley, sweet rocket (Hesperis, lilac and white), chives and alliums (ornamental onions), whose large globular white and purple heads contrast well with the tall foxgloves.
This is a very easy late-spring combination - plant the allium bulbs in autumn and the rest are prolific self-seeders - just pull out what you don't want - and they're excellent for pollinators.
Prolific self-seeders
OF all our native plants, I love foxgloves the most.
Even the common foxglove, Digitalis purpurea, is stunning, with its pink/purple blotched flower spikes, occasionally throwing up the white version, Digitalis alba.
Although the common foxglove is biennial, there are shrubby and perennial forms.
There are always foxgloves lurking around the perimeters of my garden - self-seeded under the hedge and by the fence, where I'm happy just to remove the ones that become most invasive.
The first year, you get a rosette of basal leaves, followed by a long, leafy stem the second year, which bears the flowers. It then sets seed and dies.
FOXGLOVES are poisonous, so if you have small children, be aware. Symptoms are nausea, vomiting and diarrhoea, jaundiced or yellow and blurred vision.
The plant is used to make the drug digoxin, to regulate an irregular heartbeat.
The scientific name means 'finger-like' and refers to the ease with which the flower can be fitted over a fingertip.
Although one theory is that the name goes back to the early 1300s, when the 'folks' of our ancestors were the fairies and nothing is more likely than that the pretty coloured bells of the plant would be designated 'folksgloves', afterwards, 'foxglove'.
In Wales, it is declared to be a favourite lurking-place of the fairies and in Scotland it is called 'bloody fingers' or 'deadman's bells.
Foxgloves were once used by herbalists to treat epilepsy, now long abandoned because of the difficulty in determining the correct dose.
It's been suggested that Van Gogh's 'Yellow Period' was due to being prescribed foxgloves to control his seizures, plus 'haloes' in Starry Night and multiple self portraits including the plant.
Folklore, drugs, Van Gogh
Top, one of the 6 footers; the apricot-tinged flower spike.
IF you prefer something more showy, 2012's Chelsea Flower Show-winning best new plant was the foxglove Illumination Pink.
It's a hybrid created by Thompson & Morgan between our native foxglove, Digitalis purpurea, and Isoplexis, normally found in the Canary Islands.
This latter genus was classified by botanists as separate from Digitalis, and that the two would not make a successful cross.
However Charles Valin, T&M’s plant breeder, tried the cross in 2006 and was successful. The resulting intergeneric hybrid combines the purple shades of our native foxgloves with the warm orangey colours and jagged petals of Isoplexis.
The plants are sterile and will bloom from May to November. The growing habit is also very distinct; multi-branching and compact, plants grow to a height of just 75cm (30in). Foxglove Illumination Pink is available online at http://bit.ly/1acGw4y.
Illuminating hybrid
