Mystery plant's identity solved

By Jane Clute - Special to The Herald

Several times over the years, I've mentioned a plant I absolutely adore that popped up in a flowerbed soon after we moved here and has put smiles on my face every year since. My mystery plant, I call it.

I've never seen it anywhere else, not even at a nursery or landscape center. Magazine, either. We have lots of gardening books brimming with pictures, but the mystery plant isn't one of them. Nor have I found anybody who knew a thing about it.

Even its name remained a secret till a couple of weeks ago, when a cousin sent me a copy of a picture from one of her gardening books. One glance and I knew she'd hit the jackpot. Patrinia scabiosifolia. Ohmigosh, that's it!

This plant amounts to a cluster of ground-loving leaves that certainly wouldn't turn any heads, but the bloom — ahhhh. The 4-foot bloom stalks are skinny ninnies with a teeny leaf here and there, but just wait till you see that flounce of in-your-face gold at the top. “Sharp gold,” the book “Plant Personalities by Carol Klein” aptly describes it.

The flounces are rather scarce, at least in my garden, but the quality makes up for it: teeny blooms not much bigger than a pinhead, daintily clustered in a group that can get big as your hand, maybe bigger. (Think of yarrow marrying baby's breath.) Some stalks are shorter and the bloom clusters considerably smaller — perfect in a mixed bouquet on the kitchen table.

Cut flowers last for weeks, but the beauty of this plant is the bloom clusters that shout from early summer on up until frost if you can keep your hands off them. Eventually, they start losing their crispness and shift from gold to burnished gold to brown. Then birds help themselves to the dried seed heads.

It's well-behaved (maybe too well; wish it would spread and make more babies), doesn't tolerate pests, thrives in full sun, puts up with most anything as long as it gets decent drainage and surprisingly, doesn't need staking. And butterflies and bees seem to enjoy it — but not as much as I do.

There is one problem. Most folks fall in love with it, too, and want to know where I got it. If I could remember, I'd have a lot more of it. Maybe you can help.

Several readers are asking for a foolproof way to make Christmas cactus bloom. Haha. The more you read up on the subject, the less you know. But it's generally accepted that cacti need cool, long, dry nights to set buds.

If you've kept your cacti outside in indirect light all summer (they'll love you for it), the easiest thing to do is leave them there, take away their water bottles and let nature do the hard work for you. Bring them inside when they're loaded with buds or frost threatens, whichever comes first.

(There are options. Some experts — I kid you not — say you should set a timer. That way you'll remember to stow your cactus in the closet for 13 hours a night, starting about six to seven weeks before you want it to bloom. That is, if your closet is around 55 degrees. If not, take it to the darkest corner of the basement, but be sure to bring it out of hiding every day and give it plenty of light but no direct sun and no water…. Hey, this isn't your kid, for Pete's sake.)

Seriously, when it starts budding, turn on the water but no fertilizer till it has finished blooming. Some recommend letting the plant dry out between waterings; some keep the plant slightly moist so it's a coin toss. If your friend is successful, do it her way.

Now that your cactus is loaded with buds (think positive) and you need to bring it indoors, what then? Don't put it near a heat vent or close to the fireplace (too hot), or near a door (way too drafty) or in direct sun (the plant will fry) or anywhere you're comfortable without an overcoat.

Instead, put it in a bright spot in the back bedroom or in your husband's workshop where the thermostat is turned way down, so it will last longer (and nobody will see it).

Me?

I let nature work its magic and put my blooming beauties anywhere I darn well please.