Plant name: Gaillardia 'Oranges and Lemons'

Virtues: It uniquely combines a breakthrough in color with an abundance of longer lasting blooms. The amount of flowers carried at any one time is striking. Indications show it to be more floriferous and longer flowering than any other blanketflower hybrid. In addition, it is drought and heat tolerant, attracts butterflies, and not normally browsed by deer.

Flowers: The 3-to 4-inch daisylike blooms bring luscious new color hues to the palette of these much-appreciated natives. ‘Oranges and Lemons' emerges marmalade orange with lemon yellow tips. As the flowers mature, the coloration gradually changes to warm shades of peach and melon. As the late summer and autumn temperatures decline, the coloration intensifies to shades of tangerine and orange.

Foliage: The slightly furry leaves are a pleasing shade of soft olive green.

Planting suggestions: Great paired with Sedum cauticola ‘Lidakense', Yucca ‘Color Guard', and Clematis ‘Daniel Deronda'.

For a trouble-free, drought-tolerant, and long-lasting combination, plant it with the grayish, purple-leaved Sedum cauticola ‘Lidakense' (stonecrop). This dusky colored, cushion-shaped spreader makes a perfect foreground plant. Yucca ‘Color Guard', with its architecturally rich evergreen leaves, is another fine planting partner. Yucca makes a wonderful spiky contrast to the softly textured blanketflower leaves, and its golden variegation blends nicely with the deep, warming shades of ‘Oranges and Lemons'. An unconventional combination that really works is pairing it with the blue or purple flowered Clematis ‘Daniel Deronda'. Blue, purple, and violet flowers always look great with orange tones, and they all thrive in the same sunny, free draining growing conditions.

Habit: Growing to less than 2 feet, it makes a loose, rounded mound with upright, sturdy flower stems that prominently display the flowers well above the foliage.

Season: Quite incredibly, it flowers from early summer all the way to the frosts of autumn. In mild areas, it will start even earlier (late spring) and continue longer.

Culture: Easy to grow in any sunny, well-drained location. It thrives in light, sandy or gravelly soils. Remove spent flowers for continuous display.

Uses: Makes a terrific specimen plant in mixed borders, raised beds, and rock gardens. It is even more effective when massed in bold, dramatic groupings on banks, hillsides, and open style layouts. ‘Oranges and Lemons' is perfect for gardens near the shore, and the nectar-rich central cones of the big, flat daisies make wonderful landing platforms and feeding sites for butterflies. The long-lasting, sturdy-stemmed flowers are great as cut flowers, and since this sun lover is drought and heat tolerant, it makes a dependable container plant, too.

Suggested by: Garden Splendor® brand line of premium quality plants; for more information, including where to find participating garden centers nearest to you, go to www.gardensplendor.com

Where does it come from: It turned up in the middle of a seed grown batch of Gaillardia ‘Dazzler'. It was a chance seedling that just happened to be noticed by Rosy Hardy of Hardy's Cottage Garden Plants in Whitchurch, Hampshire, in England. Rosy is a seasoned, professional nursery lady who recognizes a good plant when she sees one. She and her husband Rob have consistently won 10 gold medals for their displays at the famous Chelsea Flower Show. She says that in southern England it will flower for 10 months. Rosy told me that ‘Oranges and Lemons' is a plant with “great potential” and they “have wonderful reports of it growing well in customers' gardens throughout Britain, even in the colder and wetter areas of northern Scotland.”

Tips: It grows vigorously and flowers so much that towards late summer it is a good idea to trim it back to about 3 inches from the ground. This stimulates new bushy growth and many flowers for the fall season. As far as we know, there is no other reason to be cautious, except perhaps that with a plant this good gardening could become addictive. Look out plantaholics! ‘Oranges and Lemons' will be in our Garden Splendor® garden centers in early summer.

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