Olsynium - Podophyllum

Olsynium douglasii album £3.50
Nodding white flowers in spring over dense little clumps of rushy leaves. For rock garden or similar.
Omphalodes cappadocica 'Parisian Skies' £4
Hearty, floriferous clumper, with sky blue flowers in this form.
Omphalodes cappadocica 'Starry Eyes' £4
,A white edge to the blue flower makes it stand out well in a shady place.
Omphalodes verna alba £4
Clean white flowered form of the classic woodland groundcover.
Omphalodes verna 'Elfenauge' £4
A recent pale sky blue selection - the usual is deep blue.
Ophiopogon planiscapus 'Little Tabby' £4
Like the black thing, but heavily striped lengthwise in dark green and cream. Easy, and much in demand.
Onixotis stricta £3.75
A peculiar, winter growing, summer dormant corm in the Colchicaceae. Rush-like leaves and spikes of pretty pale lilac-pink flowers with a prominent purple centre. There's normally a lovely pot of it on display at the AGS Exeter Show in March.
Papaver orientale 'Beauty of Livermere' £4.50
Tall, with bright red flowers backed by leaf-like bracts. Terribly impressive.
Papaver orientale 'Leuchtfeuer' AGM £4.50
Glowing orange with a hint of pink, compact.
Papaver orientale 'Raspberry Queen' £4.50
Bob Brown summed it up as 'Barbara Cartland with running mascara'.

Papaver Super Poppy series
American hybrids of, supposedly, complex parentage. In horticultural terms I'd sum them up as oriental poppies with thicker, tougher, glossy petals which means the flowers last quite a lot longer (last year a 'Jacinth' flower lasted 10 days even inside a polytunnel in sunny weather!). This is a very good feature. Four varieties on offer this year.
Papaver 'Jacinth' (Super Poppy series) £5
Glossy red-pink.
Papaver 'Medallion' (Super Poppy series) £5
Purple pink, rather Patty's Plum-ish.
Papaver 'Shasta' (Super Poppy series) £5
Grading from light pink at the petal edge to white at the base.
Papaver 'Tequila Sunrise' (Super Poppy series) £5
Rather frilly pinky orange.

Paradisea lusitanica £5
Fine upstanding spikes of good sized, pure white, flared trumpet shaped flowers in early summer. Good fertile garden soil in sun or part shade. Height approaches 1m with us.
Pelargonium rodneyanum £3.75
Tuberous pelargoniums have a tricksy reputation, but this Aussie is perfectly easy, and hardy with us. Low and a bit spready, with lots of bright purple-pink flowers over a long summer season. Strangely uncommon.
Pelargonium sidoides £3.75
Small maroon flowers over silvery foliage - very pretty actually. Romped through last winter with unheated protection only.
Peltoboykinia watanabei £4
Deeply lobed, shining green peltate leaves up to 30cm across; creamy flower spikes; height around 40cm. A handsome foliage plant for a cool, moist position - if you have a depressingly high rainfall you can even grow it in sun, as they do to good effect at the Garden House.
Penstemon digitalis 'Ruby Tuesday' £4
Herbaceous species with nothingy lilac flowers but impressive beetroot-stained foliage. It's much like 'Husker Red', but doesn't suffer from the risk of getting an inferior seed raised plant.
Penstemon hidalgensis £4.50
Thanks to the splendid Portland Pitmans, champions of all things Penstemon, for seed of this huge rare species from high altitudes in Mexico. In the wild it tops 1.8m, rather less in the garden. The stem leaves clasp the stem in opposite pairs, the flowers are purple and quite big. It remains to be seen how much protection it will need as a perennial. Keep plants received in autumn in the greenhouse or coldframe overwinter. In colder parts of the USA it can be grown as an annual, which may be the way forward here.
Penstemon smallii £4
A smart species with big, toothed leaves, with a (healthy) brownish tint much of the time, and lilac flowers. 40cm.
Persicaria amplexicaulis 'Inverleith' £5
A short (max 75cm, often much less), compact and very well behaved form of this sometimes overbearing species. Short spikes of dark red flowers, handsome dark green foliage.
Persicaria amplexicaulis 'Rosea' £5
Up to 1m tall in good ground, making a very dense clump with slender spikes of pink flowers. Very attractive - used in quantity in the long borders at Rosemoor.
Persicaria bistorta 'Hohe Tatra' £4
A smart, very bright pink, relatively short form of another variable species; again, it does not seem as thuggish as many.
Persicaria polymorpha £5
The best of the tall white species, we reckon. Big panicles of white flowers, ageing pinkish. Can reach 2m when established. It does not run (honest, guv!), and is not picky about soil. Few.
Petasites paradoxus £4
As a rule, never trust a butterbur if you've less than half an acre to plant it in. This is a true exception, and beautiful to boot. Dense clumps of silvery foliage to 40cm. Small heads of gently fragrant flowers in late winter, before the new leaves.
Phegopteris decursive-pinnata £4
The Japanese Beech Fern. Gently spreading clumps of soft, pale green fronds, curled in at the tips and edges during spring, to excellent effect. A delicate-looking but easy little fern for a woodsy spot.
Peucedanum ostruthium 'Daphnis' £4
If you fancy that variegated ground elder but fear for the safety of your garden, this is a much more restrained look-alike, with excellent sunproof yellow variegation. The flowers are hogweedy, but harmless enough. Paul 'Edulis' Barney (the clue's in the name) persuaded me to try one of the so-called edible leaves the other day - it tastes like celery leaf with added poison.
Phlox glaberrima 'Morris Berd' £4.50
A nice bushy herbaceous thing, with big pink flowers all over, rather than on top of the clump. Horticulturally, it's 'Bill Baker' with bigger flowers.

Phlox paniculata
Phlox paniculata 'Blue Paradise' £4.50
The bluest we know, a luscious colour in cool, moist weather; around 60cm.
Phlox paniculata 'Mary Christine' £4
Perhaps the scarcest of the variegated cultivars, tricksy to propagate and rarely seen. It has a clean white variegation with good sized pink flowers, much like the colour of the old indestructable passed on from one cottage garden to the next. The variegation varies a little from shoot to shoot, although is far from random; reversions are occasionally seen and should be removed. We gave our original plant to Sarah's Mum quite a few years ago, and she has come to think very highly of it. Thanks to Beeches Nursery and Kevin's turbocharged plantsmanship.
Phlox paniculata 'Monica Lynden-Bell' £4.50
Very pale pink from dark buds, and shorter than some, around 60cm.
Phlox paniculata 'Utopia' £4.50
Really tall - 1.5m and self-supporting in Sarah's mum's garden, with very large dense heads of pale pink flowers again; not often seen and a great favourite of mine. All have the classic summer evening fragrance.

Phyteuma spicatum £4
Cylindrical white flower spikes make the Spiked Rampion look very different to the more familiar blue, round-headed ones.
Pimpinella major 'Rosea' £4
Here, however, it's the clean pink flowers which are memorable. 1m or so in flower, but delicate. Easy.
Pinellia pedatisecta £4
Pretty summer growing Asiatic aroid. Slender soft greeny yellow spathes to 30cm in early summer. Not a dangerous bulbil maker! Shade.
Plectranthus excisus £4
Forget the look of the tender species, and think of this as a hardy Coleus. The leaves are interesting - some gremlin has bitten the tip off each and replaced it with one that's too small. Dies down completely in winter.
Podophyllum delavayi £6
The large, six lobed peltate leaves are very heavily red-mottled, and have a wonderfully velvety look. The flowers are dark red, quite big, but cower under the leaves, gently emitting the smell of a tennis ball that's been left in wet grass for several months. A first rate foliage plant for a good woodsy position, nonetheless.
Podophyllum peltatum £4
North America's May Apple is an attractive, slowly clumping woodland perennial, with pairs of smart peltate (that's umbrella-ish, crudely) leaves and a waxy white flower in the axil. Runs more than the other species.
Podophyllum pleianthum £5
Start with delavayi (above), make the leaves scarcely lobed, so almost hexagonal, and turn them a shiny apple green.
Podophyllum 'Spotty Dotty' £6
On the same theme, but very spotty, rather than nearly all red or entirely green. This is an impressive plant when established in a woodsy bed, as at Rosemoor. Plant Breeders Rights, so we had to buy some little ones in for you and grow them on.