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Plant Talk

Inside The New York Botanical Garden

Tip of the Week — 10/27/08

Posted in Gardening Tips on October 27 2008, by Sonia Uyterhoeven

Mum Madness
Sonia Uyterhoeven is Gardener for Public Education at The New York Botanical Garden.

Tiny ChrysanthemumOne of my favorite perennials in the garden is Chrysanthemum ‘Sheffield Pink’. It is dependable, requires very little care, and gets along beautifully with every perennial or shrub it encounters—bringing out the best in everyone.

In October, ‘Sheffield Pink’ is covered with pale apricot-pink daisy-like flowers. It combines wonderfully with Sedum ‘Matrona’, Aster tartaricus ‘Jin dai’, mophead hydrangeas such as Hydrangea ‘Preziosa’, and ornamental grasses.

In the Garden we have placed ‘Sheffield Pink’ in front of a Kousa dogwood (Cornus kousa) and a drift of Aster tartaricus ‘Jin dai’. As the season progresses, the foliage of the Kousa dogwood changes to a fiery red and picks up all the tints of red and pink in the ray petals of the chrysanthemum. The purple-blue of the aster adds a colorful edge to the design.

Migrating monarchs flock to ‘Sheffield Pink’ to be joined by bees for a late-season snack. I cut this mum back by half in mid-June to encourage good branching and to restrain its height so that I don’t have to go out and stake it once the stems are laden with flowers.