Geranium palustre

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Price:  £4.50 –+ Add to Basket Brand:  The Plantsman's Preference Family:  Geraniaceae Main Season:  Summer Flower Colour:  Purple Leaf Colour:  Green Foliage:  Deciduous Position:  Light/Part Shade Soil Type:  Ordinary, medium loam Height:  15cm to 30cm (6" to 12") Peat Free?  Yes Hardiness Guide:  RHS H7 minimum at least -20C Pot Size:  9cm Availability:      Approx. 1 in stock View our Pot Size guide:

Low growing clumps with purple flowers in summer. An easily grown perennial with a long season of flower. Ordinary to moist soil in sun or light shade. 30cm.

Geranium palustre is an European native cranesbill from meadows and grassland which seems to have been neglected by gardeners over the years.  Although the flowers are not huge, it does produce them over a long season and also has the advantage of a good autumn foliage display so it is certainly worth considering for the garden.

In spring the neat clumps of rich green leaves will start into growth early producing extending flower stems (ideal for growing amongst other perennials) with the first flowers out in late May or early June.  Unless the weather gets very hot and dry, flowering usually continues through to the autumn.  If it gets straggly in midsummer then you can cut it back hard in July or early Agust to encourage more flowers later.

Geranium palustre is at it's best grown amongst other perennials like Iris sibirica, Monarda and PErsicaria amplexicaulis where it will meander through and produce clouds of it's rich pink flowers into the light wherever it can.  It isn't big enough to swamp most other perennials though, producing few leaves and only growing to 30cm on it's own, though it can extend to 90cm with competition.

Growing in good soil that probably doesn't dry out in the wild, it has proved very versatile with us and tolerates some shade as well as quite dry sites.  Geranium palustre can self-seed a little but has not done so excessively here.

Eastern Europe.