BY L O I S T R I G G C H A P L I N
CHIVES THAT TASTE LIKE GARLIC Each August, garlic chives add to their charms with a mass of white flowers. Native bees, syrphid flies, small beetles and other beneficial insects are attracted to them during late summer’s dearth of new garden blossoms. The rest of the year, the lasting attraction of garlic chives is their flat, garlic-flavored leaves. You can use them like the better-known onion chives in soups, scrambled eggs, dip, pizza topping, salad dressings, and other recipes. Just add them near the end of any cooking process because their mild flavor is destroyed by heat. The perennial plants live for years and can reseed to the point of becoming weeds, so give them a spot where they can be managed. Today, dependable, food-producing plants are especially relevant, especially those that can help us flavor a multitude of dishes and are easy to share. Each plant forms a lush clump that grows fast, especially in the cool weather. Plants prefer full sun, but will grow in partial shade, too. Once established they endure summer and winter with no problem; the thing that they don’t like is soggy soil. This herb also grows well in pots, which is a good way to grow it if space is limited. Clumps will naturally grow larger yielding lots
Garlic chives
of fresh harvests. Seedlings can become weedy, so to avoid seedlings, simply cut off the blooms after they fade so that seeds will not form. You can dig and divide clumps to start more plants or share with friends.
PENTAS, A BUTTERFLY MAGNET This time of year herbaceous flowering plants sold in garden centers are likely to be flowering tropicals or large annuals and perennials in full bloom. Pentas may be either, depending on where you live. In Coastal Alabama, pentas are sometimes perennial with some winter protection; in colder parts of the state it is a tropical killed back by freezing weather. But no matter what the location, it’s a butterfly and hummingbird magnet in the summer. The plant is named for the characteristic star shape of five petals of the bloom which come in white or shades of red, pink and purple. Buy these in containers to add an instant spot of color in a flower bed or fill a container for the rest of summer and early fall and enjoy watching hummingbirds feed as they migrate through your garden. Locate plants where they get some afternoon shade.
Pentas
August/September 2022
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