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Grandiflora
(Mountain Thistle)
This shrubby, spreading, semi-evergreen to evergreen perennial bears spiny, leathery leaves that are sharply divided and have attractive silver markings. For most, this native of West Africa is less of an ornamental and more of a weed. Mountain thistle is adapted to the forest understory and grassy fields, so it grows well in sunny and shaded locations.
Tall, upright spikes of pinkish tubular flowers appear from summer to fall. These are highly attractive to bees. Spent flower spikes should...
James Burghardt
(Cardoon)
What a bold, architectural perennial for the garden! Cardoon is a handsome herbaceous plant that produces huge rosettes of spiny, silvery arching leaves. In the second year this close relative of the artichoke produces tall, multi-branched stems topped with enormous thistle-like blooms of violet-blue. These appear from early to midsummer. Bees and butterflies love the blossoms of this native of the Azore Islands and Mediterranean.
Cardoon may also be enjoyed as a vegetable, though its use is...
James H. Schutte
(Blue Echinops, Smaller Globe Thistle)
Prickly, thistle-like foliages is a deep green with silvery undersides is one pretty aspect of the blue echinops, but the showstopper is the rounded blue flower clusters in late summer. A upright, clump-forming perennial, it hails from southeastern Europe eastward into central Asia.
The dark green leaves are coarsely lobed, looking like leaves of a thistle or pointy-leaf oak. There are white fibers on the leaf edges at times and the undersides are a downy white-gray. In late summer stems are...
