What better way to start the New Year at The Frustrated Gardener than with a plant that flowers through the darkest, coldest months. The winter heliotrope, Petasites fragrans, is so called because it produces tiny clusters of flower that are said to smell like cherry pie. I don’t quite make that culinary connection, but it’s certainly a pleasant and unexpected fragrance to stumble upon during a winter walk. Others liken the scent to liquorice, aniseed or vanilla.
Winter heliotrope is not a British native wildflower. It was introduced to our gardens in the 19th Century on the strength of its lilac-pink, powderpuff flowers and delicious scent. One can imagine Victorian ladies being greatly amused by this unusual new discovery planted daintily on a stream bank or in a sheltered dell. However, like several other vigorous non-natives, winter heliotrope was far from lady-like in its behaviour, quickly finding itself at home along roads and hedges, in ditches and alongside rivers. A great distance from its native lands of Sardinia and North Africa, winter heliotrope found Britain, the south in particular, a home from home. According to the RHS only male plants may be found in the UK and Ireland, hence every one is genetically identical. The plant spreads vegetatively via creeping, underground rhizomes, forming clumps several metres across when uninhibited.
As an invasive ‘alien’, winter heliotrope is not too offensive. It will not tolerate regular disturbance, so the least harmful approach is to keep digging it up if it appears where it’s not wanted. Otherwise allow winter heliotrope to form large carpets, making sure you can get close to it in winter to appreciate the scent. The flower stems are short, so you may have to bend to get your nose into the little clusters of bloom. Small, heart-shaped, green leaves emerge shortly after the flowers.
I’ve not been able to ascertain a great deal about winter heliotrope’s wildlife value, except to establish that it may crowd out natives given the perfect conditions for its growth. I imagine in sensitive and protected landscapes it could cause serious problems, but for most of us it is, at worst, a persistent weed. The photographs in this post were taken along a stretch of path between Kingsdown and Walmer in Kent. With gardens on one side and the English Channel on the other, the heliotrope seemed much happier in the shingle beach than it did in cultivated soil. Those with sharp eyes will spot young tree mallows (Malva arborea) and the emerging leaves of Alexanders (Smyrnium olusatrum) in the scene above. Only the mallow is native and all can be found in the Mediterranean, which says something about how mild this stretch of the Kent coastline is.
Whilst perhaps not a plant for deliberate cultivation in our gardens, winter heliotrope is a welcome sight from now until the end of February when everything else is looking drab and smelling distinctly earthy. TFG.
Categories: Daily Flower Candy, Flowers, Foliage, fragrance, Perennials, Plants, Plants in Detail, Walks, Wild Flowers
Very interesting. Thanks. We are planning a walk in that direction today and will look out for it. Happy New Year!
I am sure you won’t have missed it. There were some splendid clumps. Did you also see the yuccas and bergenias enjoying beach conditions? Marvellous.
That is the trouble with some invasives. They are often quite pretty, have a good fragrance and the grow like a demon. This is one I will watch out for and not purchase. I have never seen it offered around here. Our climate is probably too severe for it.
Maybe. It does diminish towards the north of England and Scotland, presumably because it isn’t completely tolerant of cold winters. I think there are other, less risky ways to inject scent into a winter garden.
Good that P fragrans is manageable in the UK. It’s invasive cousin P. japonicus is tempting in the US for its large handsome foliage, but very hard to contain. Beware!
Noted. Petasites japonicus is not especially common here in the UK. In fact the RHS only list 3 sources. Handsome foliage, as you say, but sounds like a plant best suited to very large gardens with conscientious gardeners who won’t let it escape!
Thank you! I spotted this all along the ditches on our Boxing Day walk and meant to look it up, but of course forgot.
Ah yes, I do that all the time. So easy to take things for granted. My new beau is an expert on birds and has informed me that all the birds I refer to as gulls are actually a mixture of egrets, gulls and fulmars, as well as pointing out lots of rare species I never appreciated lived around Broadstairs. It’s been a revelation!
Is it just me or does it look like it is related to Polygonaceae instead of compositae? I know what the flowers are like, but the rest of the appearance looks odd, like buckwheat.
great article. We at http://www.gardenernorthampton.com we love to get new ideas. Thanks
Dear Dan, this flower has foxed us for ages, merrily growing along the side of the road down to Duckpool. We have searched wild flower books in vain and now we know why. Font of knowledge that you are, we will have to go out for one of our favourites walks and smell the flowers, and now we can correctly identify them!
It is a remarkable and incongruous fragrance, but I do like it for that. Wildflower books tend to overlook non-natives which is a bit silly as winter heliotrope is common and clearly here to stay.
Now we know what it is called, Mr TT has found it in two Dorling Kindersley books that we own, we obviously had not searched very effectively!
Just identified this today with difficulty after seeing it flower at an NT garden on Boxing Day in Devon and then found your blog! I love the plant – a bit like Bergenia. Managed to snaffle a root or two for our woodland garden where I really don’t mind if it’s a little bit invasive. Does anyone know if it’s resistant to deer and rabbits ? That would be a huge plus for us….
Yes, a little like a bergenia I suppose. I imagine it would be nibble resistant. I think it takes a lot to keep winter heliotrope at bay!
We have a very big patch of this plant under a 100ft lime tree in our large garden in Dorking. The house was built in 1844 and I’m wondering if this might have been part of the original planting scheme. It’s certainly invasive and fast growing but we cut it back annually to keep it at bay! The flower are a joy to see at this time of year and smell pleasantly sweet. I actually spotted the first flowers today 29 November, so quite early this year.
Thinking of this for a wildish cum meadow area which gets cut about August onwards. Sounds like it appears (flowers) late November with leaves after. Does it disappear underground in the Summer?
While I agree this flower looks and smells nice, and it can brighten up the otherwise fairly bleak winter months, it is an absolute pest in our garden and in our local area (Carmarthenshire). We’ve been trying to get rid if it from our garden for years, digging it all up multiple times a year, but it just won’t go away. The rhizomes and root system are so deep, extensive, and difficult to dig up, and will grow back from just a tiny fragment. On the banks of some country lanes it has taken over to the extent that it certainly looks like the native species are choked out. It wouldn’t be quite so bad if it was edible, but I would warn off anyone contemplating introducing this aggressive weed into their garden, or doing anything to propagate it anywhere. I’d say we need a horticultural dalek to exterminate it!