Heath

Heaths and heathers (Calluna, Erica, Daboecia) - Beautiful shrubs, of which the kinds that are wild in Europe are very precious for gardens. We should take more hints from our own wild plants and bring the hardy Heaths into the garden. Why should we have such things as the Alternanthera grown with care and cost in hothouses, and then put out in summer to make our flower gardens ridiculous, while neglecting such lovely hardy things as our own Heaths and their many pretty varieties? But very many people do not know how happy these Heaths are as garden plants, and how well they mark the seasons, and for the most part at a time when people go into the country. Where, as in many country places, the Heaths abound, there is less need to cultivate them, although we cultivate nothing prettier. In places large enough for bold Heath gardens it would be well to plant them, but a small place is often large enough for a few beds of hardy Heaths. Once established they need very little attention. The varieties are often quite as free as the wild sorts, and give delightful color in a Heath garden, which need not by any means be a pretentious affair, but quite simple; for heaths are best on the nearly level grounds. This group of plants has as yet had but scant care, and if grown at all, is grown in a poor way, and more for its "botanical interest" than from any just sense of its great beauty. That can only be fairly judged of by those who see Heaths on mountains and moors, where they are among the most beautiful of plants in effect in broad masses. This can hardly ever be shown in small gardens, but why should it not be in large ones? We need not even have a garden to cultivate Heaths in a picturesque way, as almost any rough open ground will do, and some kinds will do among bushes and in woody places. The larger Heaths, where grown, should be massed in visible groups, and the dwarf ones seen in masses also, and not treated as mere "specks" on rockeries. They are all of easy culture, and all the dwarf kinds of easy increase by pulling in pieces and re-planting at once any time from October to April.

Tree Heath

Tree Heath (Erica arborea) - A tall and graceful shrub of Southern Europe and N. Africa; white flowered, and covering vast areas in the upland woods of Oak or other trees, attaining a height of 12 feet or more in N. Africa, and in the Canaries becoming a tree. This Heath is tender in Britain generally, but may be grown in southern and warm districts and on warm soil in sheltered valleys near the sea with its friendly warmth.

Southern Heath

Southern Heath (Erica australis) - A pretty bush heath of the sandy hills and wastes of Spain and Portugal, 2 feet to 3 feet high, flowering in spring in Britain. The flowers are rosy purple or white and fragrant. It deserves a place in heathy soils.

Winter Heath

Winter Heath (Erica carnea; sometime listed as Erica herbacea) - A jewel among mountain Heaths, and hardy as the rock Lichen. On many ranges of Central Europe at rest in the snow in winter, in our mild winters it flowers in January in the South, and in all districts is in bloom in the dawn of spring—deep rosy to pure white flowers, carpeting the ground, the leaves and all good in color. There are many varieties. This Heath is not averse to loamy soils, and often thrives on them as well as on peat soil.

Dorset Heath

Dorset Heath (Erica ciliaris) - A lovely plant, and as pretty as any Heath of Europe. A native of Western France and Spain in heaths and sandy woods; it also comes into southern England, and is hardy farther north than the districts it inhabits naturally. The flowers range from white to purple-crimson. It is excellent in every way, thriving in loamy as well as in peaty soils, and flowering in summer and into late autumn.

Bell heather

Bell heather (sometimes erroneously called Scotch Heath) (Erica cinerea) - a dwarf and pretty Heath common in many parts of Ireland and Britain, easily grown, and having good varieties. Very pretty for rock gardens.

Irish Heath

Irish Heath (Erica erigena, formerly Erica hibernica or Erica mediterranea) - a fine shrub native in counties Mayo and Galway, growing from 2 to 5 feet high. It also occurs in restricted habitats in France, Portugal and Spain.

Portuguese Heath

Portuguese Heath (Erica lusitanica, formerly listed as E. codonodes) - This is for Britain the most precious of the taller Heaths, 2 to 4 feet high, and, hardier than the Tree Heath, it may be grown over a larger area. Even in a cool district I have had it in a loamy soil ten years, and almost every year it bears lovely wreaths of flowers in mid-winter, white flowers with a little touch of pink, in fine, long, Foxbrush-like shoots. A shrub of rare beauty for sea coast and mild districts.

Many-flowered Heath

Many-flowered Heath (Erica multiflora) - Somewhat like a white Cornish Heath, but dwarf and close-set; flowers, in the form usually grown, white; many in close racemes. Southern Europe and North Africa on calcareous soil, thriving in ordinary soil in gardens.

Broom Heath

Broom Heath (Erica scoparia) - A tall and wiry-looking Heath, reaching 8 feet or more in England, flowering in summer, not showy. I have seen this in cold parts of France (Sologne), and it is hardier than most of the larger Heaths; it is often naked at the bottom and bushy and close at the top.

Corsican Heath

Corsican Heath (Erica terminalis; formerly E. stricta) - A wiry-looking shrub, compact in habit, about 4 feet high, and a handsome plant. A native of the mountains of Corsica and some other parts of the western Mediterranean, flowering in summer.

Cross-leaved Heath

Cross-leaved Heath (Erica tetralix) - This beautiful Heath is frequent throughout the northern, as well as western, regions, thriving in moist or boggy places, but also in ordinary soil in gardens. This Heath has several varieties, differing in color mainly.

Mackay's Heath

Mackay's Heath (Erica mackaiana) is similar to cross-leaved Heath; mauve- and white-flowered varieties are available.

Watson's Heath

Watson's Heath (Erica x watsonii) is a hybrid between cross-leaved heath and the Dorset heath. Flowering summer and early autumn.

Cornish Heath

Cornish Heath (Erica vagans) is a vigorous bushy heather thriving in almost any soil, 2 to 4 feet high. A native of Cornwall and western France, Spain and Portugal. There are several varieties, one of the best being 'St Keverne' (rosy pink).

Hybrid Heath

Hybrid Heath (Erica Hybrida) - this name is invalid and should not be used for any hardy heath. There are several hardy hybrid heaths - these are perhaps the more important ones from the gardener's point-of-view: Erica x darleyensis (E. carnea x erigena), Erica x watsonii (E. ciliaris x tetralix), Erica x williamsii (E. vagans x tetralix), Erica x stuartii (E. tetralix x mackaiana).

Heather, Ling

Heather or Ling (Calluna vulgaris) - Ling, the common Heather, and its many varieties, are worth growing. They all require lime-free soil.

St Dabeoc's Heath

St Dabeoc's Heath (Daboecia cantabrica) - It is a beautiful shrub 18 inches to 30 inches high, bearing crimson-purple blooms in drooping racemes. There is a white variety even more beautiful, and one with purple and white flowers called 'Bicolor'. I have had the white form in flower throughout the summer and autumn on a slope fully exposed to the sun, and in very hot years too. Native in the west of Ireland, France, northern Spain and Portugal.

Related Flowers

Maw's Heath

Maws Heath (Erica Maweana) - Of this Heath, Mr Robert Lindsay writes as follows: "This is one of the handsomest of all the hardy Heaths, and was discovered by Mr George Maw in Portugal in 1872. It may be best described as a very vigorous-growing E. ciliaris, which it resembles, but is more robust in all its parts; the flowers also, besides being larger than those of E. ciliaris, are darker in color. It flowers from July to December."

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