Susan is also blogging at GardenRant.Caryopteris x clandonensis / Blue Mist Shrub
With soft gray-green foliage, light blue late summer flowers and rounded habit, it looks right at home in the perennial border. The famous variety ‘Longwood Blue' has sky blue flowers. Another popular type, 'Worcester Gold', has yellow foliage and blue flowers. Bees and butterflies love them, but deer don't — a happy combination.
The "x" in the name means it's a hybrid of two different species, so it's not actually indigenous to anywhere.
Details
- Flowers August and September.
- Needs full sun or light shade.
- Grows to 2-3' high and wide.
- Hardy in Zones 5-8.
Care
- Authorities describe it as "thriving on neglect." Sounds about right. Consider it drought-tolerant.
- Many gardeners cut it back in late winter to 12" to promote vigorous growth, and I'm one of them.
Location Matters
I grow caryopteris in the Washington, D.C. area, Zone 7A. If you've grown it and have comments you'd like to see included here, send 'em along, and tell me where you garden.
A reader responds:
I first 'discovered' the Caryopteris x clandonensis/Blue Mist Shrub in the "High Country Gardens" catalog when I lived in southeast Arizona. The bushes stayed small, grew slower, but they still thrived as long as I watered them at least once a week during the dry season. I moved back to central Iowa and planted them in my perennial garden. The first two years, I lost one or two and had to replace them, but this year, they are fantastic and spreading. I've dug up several small ones and they travelled to east Texas (just outside of Dallas) and west Texas (upper panhandle) to my son and daughter. We'll see how they do there next year, but so far, so good. My bushes are at least 3 1/2 feet tall and at least 4 feet wide.
More Great Info in Print
- Dirr's Hardy Trees and Shrubs
by the best-known authority on the subject. - Taylor's Guide to Shrubs
is another good one.