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What to plant with a red scabious?
Can any one suggest a good plant combination to go with a red scabious? I was given the plant and have put it in a narrow border behind some heucheras but it looks ridiculous. The leaves are quite flat to the ground but the stems are about 18" long with smallish red flowers. There is nothing around it so the stems are just waving around and the flowers don't seem to last very long. What type of plant would be good to combine it with if I move it to another area of the garden?
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Maybe I have the wrong name for it? I'll see if I can get a picture of it tomorrow. Are there any veronicas that are flowering at the moment? Mine have both finished now and I have cut the flowering stems down.
Ooh, I've just looked up salvia patens
lovely colour! If I can find one, do I just plant them close together and let them mingle or do I need to get several to make it work? The scabious I split into 3 pieces when I planted it so maybe I could get hold of 3 bits of the salvia too.
Thanks for those suggestions.
Sounds good. Thanks for the info - I'm off to the garden centre
Love Verdun's suggestion of silvery things. Re the red scabiuous, are we talking about Knautia macedonica? Like a wine red/burgundy coloured flower?
Veronicastrum might look good - those very angular leaves as a foil to the scattered informal clouds of Knautia flowers.
Here it is. Excuse the weeds - amazing how well they show up when you take a photo! I think that bed will be this afternoons job!
Definitely not the right place for it. When I planted it I was expecting one of the low growing mound type scabious
Would probably look quite nice growing through some grasses if that's your sort of thing. Dark purple salvias would also look good - Salvia nemerosa 'Caradonna' is a particular favourite.
I have a couple of knautia macedonica (very similar, if not the same, as your plant) and they form part of the under planting under Malus 'Evereste' and also shrub roses. Other plants under the malus include aquilegias, thalictrums and hardy geraniums. Under the shrub roses I have the knautia, hardy geraniums, alchemilla and nepeta.
It's only the second season for all these plants but it looked quite pretty in a cottage garden sort of way last year
Yep the planting area above is too small for Veronicastrum... I was thinking of a generous border with lots of Knautia (amongst other things) flowering at waist height, with the Veronicastrum pushing through. Sort of like this
I'd move those heucheras somewhere shady. And maybe it's just me, but I don't like to see the different colours of the same plant together... reminds me of a traffic light! Just my personal taste though.
This border has the Knautia as the taller plant, with lower hardy geraniums, which might be adaptable to your spot.