Growing up to 36 inches high, this herbaceous perennial is a favorite plant for the spring shade garden in temperate gardens. This is one of the first plants my daughter, Melanie, planted in this particular brick bed and it's still going strong after almost twenty years. It's produced many seedlings that both of us have distributed in shady spots in the garden. The foliage dies back after blooming and by July, there's no evidence the plant was ever there. In this particular spot there are big leaves of Japanese Anemone waiting to cover over the dormant – and invisible – Dicentra.. Elsewhere, shade-loving hosta does that job.

The name of the plant describes the shape of the flowers -- heart-shaped blooms, from which a drop of what could be called blood falls from the bottom. The flowers are very striking, the color bright, the leaves lush. Other common names for this plant are Venus's Car, Dutchman's Trousers, and Lyre Flower. It's native to eastern Asia from Siberia south to Japan.

Among the cultivars of Bleeding Heart are 'Alba' with white flowers, and 'Gold Heart' introduced in 1997 that has yellow leaves.


Almey Crabapple (Malus 'Almey')


We have at least three of these crabapples here, this one (above) showing off its colorful spring self at the drive in front of the main house. The purple flowers are the annual Honesty (Lunaria), often called Money Plant because of its seed sacks in the shape of flat gold coins. Honesty self-seeds prolifically everwhere in the area on both sides of this border. Spring daffodils are still blooming all along here, the first of the big show of spring flowers.

The Almey Crabapple has deep pink, sweet smelling flowers, and grows to about thirty feet. It's spreading and needs pruning in the spring to contain it a bit if it begins to shade sun-loving flowers underneath. The fruit is maroon and about one inch in diameter. We've never used it for cider or jelly since we have so many other crabapples easier to harvest. The value of Almey Crabapple depends solely on its very real beauty in the May garden.

Common Lilac (Syringa vulgaris)

Almost everyone loves lilacs, and we have scores  of them, especially the common lilac (Syringa vulgaris). They border the drive up to the house, shown here to the left. There is a row of them along the edge of our hill overlooking the valley, and a specimen by itself that was fairly old back when we bought the place forty-one years ago. Some are dividing the south 'Annabelle' geranium garden from the northeast gardens, and dividing the alfalfa field from the north orchard.

We have several hybrid and cultivated lilacs – S. 'Abraham Lincoln', a lovely blue; the later blooming, very large pink, S. 'Henryii'; a gorgeous S. 'Beauty of Moscow' with fulsome double white blossoms tinged with purple; another very late blooming creamy white Japanese tree lilac, Syringa reticulata subsp. reticulata (see below at the end of a row of pink Rosa 'Chelsea Morning'), and several virieties of dwarfs, notably a row of the very fragrant 'S 'Miss Kim' which grows up against our back porch; S. 'Tinker Belle', inthe west-facing brick garden; S. 'Jose´e', a rebloomer, in front of Melanie's granary; a cut leaf lilac, S. lacinata in the daylily and iris border across from The Granary

Enjoying the fragrance of these many lilacs surrounding and scattered throughout our two-and-a-half acre flower garden is a sensuous experience indeed, the perfume even wafts into the house through an open window.

To quote myself in the Lewiston History story of a few years ago (sources of the following quotes are listed at the end of the linked story) – 

"Journals existing today, mostly kept by women, tell of caring for cuttings stuck in potatoes to keep them viable during the journey over the plains.  Most often carried West was the beloved lilac, Syringa vulgaris, or Common Lilac, the easiest among the flowering shrubs to grow and transplant, or to start with seed.

"Of the lilac, another researcher writes,  'The Puritans, uprooted first from their homes in England, then from the Netherlands, could bring with them only bits and pieces of their lives.  Many chose the lilac, a living remembrance of home.'  Two centuries later, pioneers from New England took seeds and slips with them of the lilac, and here in Cache Valley, the lilac broadcasts its presence and fragrance everywhere in late May and early June.

"Beatrice Barker Nyman’s grandfather, John Barker, an English immigrant who walked across the Plains to this valley, planted slips of lilac around the rock home that he built in Newton in the 1870s. (Beatrice Barker Nyman is a Cache Valley resident)."

To the right is the tall white Japanese tree lilac in the north garden here at DragonGoose Farm. Beyond is
Melanie's house, The Granary.

I'd like to add that the lilacs bordering the three- hundred-foot-long drive up the hill to the house were planted as suckers from the common lilacs we had growing around the land up on the hill, some of them from the very old lilac that was growing here when we moved in. Also, that my youngest son dug the suckers and the holes in which they were planted. It was quite a job, but well worth the show we have every late spring.

Though Jon was not too enthusiastic about digging at the time (he was seventeen then), he has since become an avid gardener, now in his forties, in Fort Collins, Colorado, his present home. Yes, we were all surprised by this, but not too much. Gardening is obviously somewhere in his genes.