The Perennial Trial Garden Committee at CSU met recently to determine their “Top Performers” from the 2024 trial. These “Top Performers” were grown for three seasons and two winters (2022, 2023 and 2024) and performed well so as to be included as “Top Performers” for 2024.
The winners from our 2024 Top Performers are featured below. For more information about the trials, visit flowertrials.colostate.edu. The full perennial report is coming soon.
DELGENIUS™ ‘CHANTAY’ DELPHINIUM (DELPHINIUM HYBRIDS)
Pacific Plug and Liner
A staple in an English-style garden, delphiniums can be quite a showstopper for their impressive flowering stems. And Delgenius™ ‘Chantay’ doesn’t disappoint! This robust, mid to late spring flowering perennial has flower power. Each plant produced sported several rich, robust lavender-dusty antique pink spikes with clean white centers. The plants sport deep green, dissect foliage for most of the season, leading to a second flush of flowering in early to mid-fall. Staking or providing support for the heavy flowering spikes is recommended!
‘ORCHID FROST GRANDE’ LAMIUM (LAMIUM MACULATUM)
Plant Haven
Looking for an excellent, adaptable ground cover? Check out this Plant Haven introduction. An improvement on Orchid Frost, ‘Orchid Frost Grande’ sports bigger, orchid-pink flowers, dancing above a nicely variegated green and white, almost silver-like foliage. Expect a solid flush of flowers in the spring, with spots of color for the rest of the season. The new foliage and growth cover the old flowers as the season progresses, making for a ‘clean’ looking appearance.This lamium works well as a solid ground cover, adapting to sun or shade, dry and more moist conditions. Also, a great option for integrating into mixed containers!
‘EVENING SUN’ MISSOURI EVENING PRIMROSE (OENOTHERA MISSOURIENSIS)
Darwin Perennials
Native—check. Pollinator—check. Drought tolerant—check. This low-growing (~6-8”) hardy perennial also brings a pop of sunshine yellow color to the landscape! The bright yellow flowers open in the heat of the afternoon and last into the evening, attracting a variety of pollinators from bees to butterflies and moths, for weeks on end in the summer! The uniformly growing plants have attractive silver-green foliage, with few insect problems. AND, it’s an easy to propagate plant for growers, that is also a reliable first-year flowering perennial.
‘JELENA’ RUSSIAN SAGE (PEROVSKIA ATRIPLICIFOLIA, SYN. SALVIA YANGII)
Dümmen Orange
Do you want a sturdy Russian sage for the garden? Then you should consider ‘Jelena.’ This selection has the typical lavender blue flowers, prolifically flowering from early summer and into the fall. This is a great landscape plant that is good candidate for a lower water input garden! In the CSU Gardens, it reached a very uniform~36-48” tall, with no lodging! If grown drier, one could expect it to be closer to ~18-24”. It is a pollinator magnet plant, with a beautiful gray-green dissect foliage.
‘GOLDEN FEATHERS’ JACOB’S LADDER (POLEMONIUM PULCHERIMMUM)
Darwin Perennials
Polemonium for the full sun? Look no further…‘Golden Feathers’ Jacob’s ladder can tolerate more sun than the other Polemonium! This golden yellow variegated variety can pack a real punch, even on ~8” tall plants!The warm glow of the foliage, contrasts with the soft lavender-blue flowers in late spring to early summer—a bee favorite. Here in Colorado, with the highlight intensities, the best plant performance and yellow foliage coloration will be in partial sun (morning) with afternoon open or filtered shade. ‘Golden Feathers’ can also be reliably propped through tissue culture.
‘GOLDBLITZ’ BLACK-EYED SUSAN (RUDBECKIA FULGIDA VAR. SULLIVANTII)
Kleft Seed
If you’re wanting an alternative to ‘Goldsturm’, give ‘Goldblitz’ a try! This seed grown Rudbeckia can be a first-year flowering plant, with a slightly shorter production time and slightly earlier flowering—a real benefit in the retail garden centers. In our trials, it was an earlier flowering Rudbeckia, with very uniform and consistent performance over the three-year period. The 24-30” plants with golden ray florets and a rich deep brown cone, showed great vigor, with dark green foliage all the way to the end of the season. Another great plant for pollinators in the landscape.
‘CONGA LINE’ STONECROP (HYLOTELEPHIUM TELEPHIUM)
Terra Nova® Nurseries
You want to invite this one to your dance party! ‘Conga Line’ has a beautiful deep green foliage that gradually matures into a deep purple green, later in the summer. By mid-summer, the red-purple colored flower bud clusters are developing, ultimately opening into an eye catching peachy-cream dallops of color on top of upright branches. Even in our trials with more consistent irrigation, the stems were strong and upright. Like most of our sedum faves, this one also isa waterwise plant, handling lower water inputs and great pollinator plant to boot! Oh…and it handles the cold—hardy from zones 4 to 9!
‘SKYWARD BLUE’ AND ‘SKYWARD PINK’ SPEEDWELL (VERONICA LONGIFOLIA)
Darwin Perennials
Aptly named, with dozens of spires of rich violet-blue and vibrant pink, pointing to the stars. Both ‘SkywardTM Blue’ and ‘SkywardTM Pink’ are well matched in this series. Copious amounts of spikes begin in late spring, shooting off like early fireworks in the gardens and with intermittent shows all the way into fall, with simple deadheading. The dark green, lush foliage is more resistant to powdery mildew, than ‘Moody Blues.’ Either of these speedwells would be a great addition to the perennial border!
‘PRISTINE® PRINCESS PINK’BEARDTONGUE (PENSTEMON BARBATUS VAR. PRAECOX)
Dümmen Orange
Add a splash of bubblegum pink to the garden! Uniform plants boasted dozens of sturdy spikes, covered with tubular flowers in mid-summer. The crisp, glossy green foliage accented the pink flowers on ~24” stems in our trials. ‘Pristine® Princess Pink’ was a hummingbird and pollinator favorite! Ideally, good draining soil will help with plant survivability, especially in the winter. This is a great xeric plant once established!
