The Trouble With Heucheras

Heucheras have to be one of my favourite perennials. Except when they do this: Heave

My hand can wrap itself around the base of the Heuchera's crown. The crown has heaved that much!

If left like this, the Heuchera begins to fade and become weakened. I planted several cultivars: Caramel, Obsidian, Palace Purple....they all need help this year.

I find, heaving happens to heucheras when the soil they are planted in is not friable and loose. Compacted or sandy soil (like mine) or sometimes heaps of snow on top, cause this heaving and the end result showing in the above photo. It doesn't help that I have dappled shade all day. But there are ways to overcome this.

Don't be like me last year and wait too long - once the heat came in June, I lost two of my favourite cultivars. Today, it's time to pull them up.

Gently lift them and examine the crown. Like geraniums, they have a real fleshy, stalky crown which will have small mini plantlets which you can divide, as I did.

It's important to take off all the dead leaves. Heucheras are semi evergreen and like hellebores, they need to have many of their overwintering leaves removed to prevent decay of the stem/root mass. Pull them gently off the stem like you would lettuce leaves. Start at the bottom and work your way up. You'll see concentrated new growth and leaves emerging from the centre.

(The one great aspect when digging them up: you get to have more plants!)

Be thorough. With your fingers, remove any callused or flakey bits around the stem - by doing this, you'll reveal tender, fleshy white nodes that will produce new baby plantlets and roots.

Dig a bigger hole, more deeper and add organic matter, like compost or composted manure.  Water thoroughly to remove air pockets and wait a few weeks to see them bounce back.

In a week or two, this Heuchera will bounce back, doubling in size. Richer colour and a more robust habit will allow you to enjoy the plant for many years to come.

In my experience, other plants like Tiarellas and Heucherellas don't heave. But, I can't part with having Heucheras. They brighten and colour the garden like very few shade loving plants. They are the most disease and bug resistant of perennials. They may be a bit more work to take care of, yet totally worth it.

Plant Reversions - Brunnera macrophylla 'variegata'

New plant cultivars are being introduced every season.  Once plants bear "sports" (which means the parent plant will have a portion grow in slight variations from the original), nursery growers pounce on them, multiplying their numbers.  After a test run of  propagation success, they allow them to grow to true form and introduce them as new varieties..


But what happens when a strain or sport starts to revert back to the parent form?





This is happening to my Brunnera macrophylla 'variegata' (Siberian Bugloss). It's happened before at my old house, but I was surprised to see it happening again, since it doubled in size from last year.

You have to be careful and pay close attention to this reversion. The original parent plant is always stronger, more vigorous in nature and can choke out the sport. I don't want to lose its variegated leaves. It's one of the main reasons I bought it.


How to get rid of the reversion:  2 ways:

1. You can simply remove any reverted leaves whenever they emerge. This will eventually weaken its presence and will stunt its attempts to take over.

2. Dig up the entire reverting section, so that you don't sever too many feeder roots of the remaining plant, or gently wedge out the portion of the crown that is reverting. I waited a few weeks to pin-point the segment reverting. Here I teased it away (almost as though you are dividing it) from the variegata portion.

I generally replant the reverted section if roots remain - it's another plant (as I did years before) and quite lovely as plain green.

Planting in pot.

Removing the sport is best in early spring. This way the plant has time to recover and not be stressed during the heat of the summer.

Ways to insure it won't reoccur is hard to say. However, when a plant is under stress it has this tendency - greater risk of reverting back. I will be giving it a little more TLC in the future and keeping a close eye on it.