best

winter Echinocereus reichenbachii

In my last entry, I wrote about what I consider some of the best plants for winter in New Mexico. I looked primarily at the plants that provide something attractive for the winter garden, but considered the plant’s year round attributes as well. What is “best” anyway? If a plant performs incredibly in one area, but less well or even poorly in another area, does that disqualify it as a best plant? There are some plants that I enjoy in the winter, even if they aren’t the stellar performers of other plants, lacking the performance in the winter that others exceed in, or various other reasons. I wouldn’t use that as a reason not to include them in the garden. I call these plants the “also ran’s” or the “runner up’s”.

Echinocereus reichenbachii – this is such a cute little clumping cactus, with silky pink flowers for a week or two in the spring. In the winter the succulent stems diminish, so that they are barely seen as a dense tuft of spines above the ground. Although it is still attractive, the thing that makes it a runner up is that it is too small in the winter to contribute significantly to the landscape.

Cercocarpus breviflorus – although the late fall to early winter seedheads are glow in the sun, and these shrubs do well with no irrigation, the winter form lacks dynamism. The bare rugged branches are attractive enough, and I enjoy seeing the, but it doesn’t bring it out of the runner-up category.

Artemesia versicolor – this is such a great plant, it is a shame that it doesn’t perform through the winter. The finely laced silver leaves are never curly in my garden as they are in magazine pictures, even though I’ve tried various water regimens (the magazines say that to keep the leaves curly, be very sparing with the water, and believe me, I am sparing). In the winter, the plant develops some purplish tones. What keeps this plant from being a “best for winter” is that most of the leaves die and turn (silvery)brown, leaving just a tuft of silver at the tips of the stems. The plant holds on to the brown leaves, but if someone steps on it, or you pull fallen tree leaves out of it, the dead leaves come out too, leaving a bunch of twigs with scraggly silver tips.

Juniperus monosperma – Although this juniper has great fall berries (female plants only), I’m not very fond of the yellow-green winter color. It looks just a bit sickly to me. It looks better when backed by the dark green of Pinyon pines.

Cotoneaster – I suppose this genus really should be in the “best” list. After all, it’s a tough plant with colorful winter berries, and some keep their leaves. The ones that don’t make the “best” list are C. dammeri, with red berries, yes, but with a very scraggly habit and C. buxifolius, the grey cotoneaster, but I suspect that it’s horrid growing (i.e. pruning) practices that I see, that I’m opposed to. Cotoneaster’s tough nature makes it amenable to use in a lot of commercial plantings, which of course, means that it is tortured into ugliness, and suffers from commonness. Try not to hold it against this plant, but use it appropriately.

Two plants that I forgot in the “best list”:
Juniperus chinensis – needs no introduction, but with similar criticisms as cotoneaster: its ability to withstand torture means that it is used everywhere, and tortured everywhere. Some varieties turn brown in the winter.

Penstemon clutei – the tough blue-green leaves develop red tints at the tips. This great color could be picked up by the same color in Eriogonum umbellatum. Of course the glowing pink blooms that recur for a long season make it a great plant also, but that’s not a winter thing.
Penstemon clutei in winter