Urban Landscape, Native Landscape: Peony Shade Garden (Cascadia Garden)

Erythronium dens-canis & Hepatica americana February 2010

Asarum caudatum February 2010

Trillium chloropetalum April 2009

Heuchera americana 'Bronze Beacon'

Paeonia suffruticosa 'Yoshinogawa' May 2009

The best part of the Cascadia Garden began with a pink single Paeonia suffruticosa in 1997. Enchanted by the huge pink flowers, I added 4 more between 2001 & 2006. By the spring of 2007 there was enough shade to plant a variety of woodland perennials. After a colorful display of red & orange fall foliage, evergreen & early-blooming perennials are clearly visible beneath the Paeonia suffruticosa until late spring. Erythronium, Hepatica, Heuchera & Trillium are my favorite plants that hug the ground.

Plant List

Shrubs

Paeonia suffruticosa: pink single

Paeonia suffruticosa: pink double

Paeonia suffruticosa ‘Renkaku’

Paeonia suffruticosa ‘Yoshinogawa’

Paeonia suffruticosa ‘Zi Er Giao’ (see photo above)

Perennials

Aruncus aesthusifolius (Dwarf Goat’s Beard)

Athyrium niponicum ‘Pictum’ (Japanese Painted Fern)

Blechnum spicant (Deer Fern)

Cimicifuga racemosa ‘Hillside Black Beauty’ (Bugbane)

Corydalis cava

Dicentra formosa (Bleeding Heart)

Epimedium pinnatum colchicum

Erythronium dens-canis (Dog Tooth Violet)

Erythronium oregonum (Fawn Lily)

Euphorbia amygdaloides ‘Purpurea’ (Purple Wood Spurge)

Geranium ‘Johnson’s Blue’ (Cranesbill)

Geranium phaeum (Mourning Widow)

Hacquetia epipactis

Hakonechloa macra ‘Albo Striata’ (Japanese Forest Grass)

Helleborus lividus (Hellebore)

Hepatica americana (Liverwort)

Heuchera americana ‘Dale’s Strain’

Heuchera americana ‘Bronze Beacon’

Heuchera americana ‘Green Spice’

Heuchera americana ‘Plum Pudding’

Heuchera americana ‘Velvet Night’

Polygonatum odoratum ‘Variegatum’ (Solomon’s Seal)

Polystichum munitum (Sword Fern)

Primula x juliana ‘Wanda’ (Primrose)

Tellima grandiflora (Fringecup)

Trillium chloropetalum (Giant Trillium)

Trillium cuneatum (Bloody Butcher)

Trillium luteum (Yellow Toadshade)

Trillium ovatum (Western Wake Robin)

Trillium sessile (Toadshade)

Groundcovers

Asarum caudatum (Wild Ginger)

Fragaria vesca (Woodland Strawberry)

Maianthemum dilatatum (False Lily of the Valley)

Oxalis oregana (Redwood Sorrel)

Sedum forsterianum

About This Blog

This blog began in 2008 as Metropolitan Gardens to provide information on gardening in Seattle & places like it. Click on Gardening in Cascadia. The blog expanded to include Parks P-Patches Public Gardens in the US, Canada & Europe. Then Nature was added. (The difference between nature & gardens is intent. Nature happens. Gardens are planned.) Many recent posts are not about Seattle, or even Cascadia. They are Urban Landscape: streetscape & architecture. Cascadia is the region including the Cascade Mountains of Washington & Oregon. If you want to contact the blogger, leave a message in comments. Comments are moderated & private messages will not be posted.

Our Land & Climate

The city of Seattle rests between 2 bodies of water: Puget Sound & Lake Washington. Puget Sound is a substantial part of the Salish Sea & a very small part of the Pacific Ocean. The Salish Sea is set apart from the Pacific by the Olympic Peninsula in the state of Washington & Vancouver Island in the province of British Columbia. The dense, wet clouds of the Pacific Ocean travel as far as the Cascade Mountains, near the Salish Sea & not very far from the ocean. East of the Cascades lies the desert of the Columbia Basin. The moist, temperate climate of Seattle extends south to northern California & north to southeastern Alaska. The Pacific Northwest Coast from San Francisco Bay to Cook Inlet shares a flora dominated by evergreen coniferous forest. The central portion, west of the Cascade Mountains, is called Cascadia. The climate is cool & wet from fall to spring, warm & dry in summer. The Olympic Mountains block Seattle from much of the Pacific rainfall. Seattle is drier than the Atlantic coast of North America & northern Europe, cooler in summer & warmer in winter. It lies near the latitude of Paris & Quebec City.