Pulmonaria: A Colorful Plant for the Shade Garden

If you live in the south, you appreciate the shade and hope you have shade, but the drawback of having shade is that not many bright colorful fun flowers love the shade. I just posted on a good shrub for the shade, today we'll talk about a perennial. Enter the pulmonarias. Pulmonarias are a super great genus of plants for the home shade garden.

You see I have a problem, I like flowers and color and plants. I want color all year around and I want it loud and bright and I want my gardens to say "Look at me!" It is extremely difficult to do this in shade and so I am finally accepting this fact. I must remember to no longer plant poor little coneflowers and 'Goldsturm' in the shade, hoping for the best. Sigh. I must no longer scatter those peonies and Joe Pye weed and catmint and irises and daylillies in less than ideal light conditions-well you get it. It is time to work with the shade and embrace-cough-cough-it.
I have found in the past five years of growing pulmonaria that these darling little foliage plants really deliver on the color and the flowers and the brightness in my gardens. I grow two varieties. Pulmonaria x 'Trevi Fountain', and Pulmonaria longifolia 'Diane Clare'. 'Diane Clare' is pictured above with a hosta. I profiled 'Trevi Fountain' as Plant of the Month for April 2008. It is early this year and as we speak is in full bloom and will stay that way for a good month or more. Pulmonarias are super good companions for hostas.

A recent purchase from Bluestone Perennials is Pulmonaria saccharata (sometimes officialis) 'Sissinghurst White' is expected any day now. Purchasing another cultivar is a big step for me, as you see I am really trying to embrace those shade loving perennials. It's not like I don't have the hostas and Solomon's seal and heucheras and hellebores and lily of the valleys, well you get it, I have plenty of shade loving perennials but they just don't quite do it the same as the sun loving perennials.

Pulmonarias are the exception to the shade rule if you will. They bloom for a pretty long period of time, look good most of the year and are evergreen. The only period of the year I think the pulmonarias tend to look ratty is late December to late January and mid to late summer when the plants can look very wilty due to the heat.

The gardener needs only to plant the pulmonaria in shade to part shade, a moist but well drained spot and close to a pathway or the front of the garden so that the plant can be enjoyed up close. Pulmonarias are ground huggers, except when they flower, and oh boy do they flower. The colors come in blue, purple, pink and all shades and tones of the above mentioned colors. It is really quite astounding to see the pulmonarias flower.

If the pulmonaria is happy, after it gets established it will grow and spread slowly to about two feet wide. In my experience you cannot divide the pulmonaria successfully. But! After a few years the gardener will be rewarded with some seedlings of the pulmonaria-something that is very desireable in my garden.

One more note about the pulmonarias. Are you familiar with the term pulmo? It means lung. A doctor might say you have had a 'pulmonary' embolism (I hope not!). The pulmonary part of course refers to the lungs. The pulmonaria because pulmonaria was traditionally used as a remedy against lung diseases. Pulmonaria is also known as 'lungwort'. What an awful name for such a fun and great plant in the shade garden.

in the garden....