Dan's Papers - June 6, 2008 - Earthly Delights by April Gonzales

Hostas need little more than water to grow. They can tolerate sandy acid soil, and deep shade. Years ago I saw a mature specimen of crispy blue leaved Hosta "Big Daddy" in my friend Fleurette's garden. Its pointed, down turned leaves glowed in the shade. She had special ordered the perennial, unusual at the time, from a catalogue. Now it is easily available and very popular as it is one of the best big blue leaved varieties. Many types of hosta have been developed over the last 15 years, and all are just gorgeous additions to a shade garden, but Big Daddy is still one of my three favorites.

Okay - four favorites. Sum and Substance has leaves that are even larger that Big Daddy's, and a mature plant is a true garden specimen. The leaves are huge, rounded and upward arching, the form being accentuated by their yellow hue. This plant will also glow in the shade, but gets even brighter in the sun. I have a big bank of it behind my "Big Daddys". Unfortunately the flower is lavender, not white which I prefer. "August Moon" with its white flower, would work blended in, but the plant itself is only two thirds the size of "Sum and Substance." Used together, these two varieties can make a wonderful cascading bank of chartreuse in the shade.

You can't beat the old standby, Hosta sieboldiana elegans. It's easy to find in nurseries. The blue green leaves are cupped and upward facing. It is corrugated in texture and a deeper, frostier blue than Big Daddy. "Thunderbolt" has the same wonderfully shaped blue green leaves with a creamy yellow center that turns white later in the summer. Blue Angel and Blue Umbrellas are perhaps the largest of the blues, reaching 3' high by 4' wide. It can take 3-4 years for them to put on some size but once they do they're dramatic accents.

The only other Hosta that I've bought for myself is "Regal Splendor" a fountain-esque, upright, elegant plant that was developed from "Krossa Regal." "Regal Splendor" has wavy cream colored margins along the edge of each leaf. Like "Sum and Substance" though, their lavender flowers usually get dead headed in my yard before they ever have the chance to bloom.

Many Hostas are fragrant, like H. plantaginea, or "Honey bells" or H. hyacintha. And when it comes to variegation there are so many varieties that you could have a Persian carpet like effect in the garden using green and white, yellow and green, or blue and cream leaved hostas surrounded by the solid green and blue colors like a tapestry border. "Frances Williams" is a popular old garden variety with wonderful large corrugated yellow and blue green leaves.

I can't say where the common name of "funkia" is derived from, and so few people even use it any more. But some of the new Hosta varieties' names are equally entertaining. "Hi Ho Silver," "Minute Man," "Lakeside Dragon Fly," and "Blazing Saddles" all made their debuts over the last few years.

Protect your hostas, which are the favored food of both deer and voles. One eats them from the top down and the other from the bottom up. Slugs like them too and can leave the leaves rather perforated. Just a little prevention helps keep all these pests at bay. Mulching with pine needles keeps the slugs from slithering over, a bi-weekly spray of hot sauce will encourage the deer to keep their lips off your plants and a few moth balls under the pine needles will discourage the delicate noses of mice.

For more than 20 years, April Gonzales has been involved in garden design, installation and maintenance on the East End, as well as specimen plant scouting and site supervision for landscape architects.