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Pollinator Plants

pollinator

We will soon be planning our gardens for the coming seasons and checking online and in catalogs for plants to order. In the winter months I must confess that I often use ordering as a substitute for actually having my hands in the dirt.

This year, I'm going to buy more plants that provide food and shelter for pollinators. I seem to have a yen for a large, fragrant, deep-red but compact coneflower called Echinacea ‘Dixie Scarlet'. Dixie is drought tolerant as well as being a magnet for pollinators.

I also want a dark-gold torchflower, Kniphofia ‘Banana Popsicle', with repeat blooms from July to October. And it shrugs off drought as well as having a yummy name!

Since I like pink, I'm also eager to get my hands on a three-to-four-foot shrub Potentilla fruticosa ‘Pink Beauty', which has semi double flowers that even hold up in heat to zone 4.

There is also hardy pink Salvia ‘Eveline' with bicolor pink and purple hooded flowers in late spring to zone 5.

I was also thinking of ordering some phlox but decided to be sensible and not try any more plants that the deer devour. I want as many pollinators as I can get to visit my garden, but I'm not keen to attract deer, as they also bring ticks as well as their voracious appetites.

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