The tropics, grown against the odds. Sub-tropicals bring bold leaves, vivid flowers, and a whiff of the jungle to gardens well north of the frost line, thriving through a hot Southern summer and, with a little shelter, holding on through the cold.
Tibouchina granulosa, the purple glory tree, is a Brazilian showstopper long grown in Florida and the warm South, a large shrub or small tree in frost-free gardens and a root-hardy dieback perennial where winters brush freezing. Glossy, deeply pleated, prominently veined leaves set off the flowers, which come smaller but far more abundantly than those of the better-known princess flower, Tibouchina urvilleana, so the whole plant seems dusted with purple through the warm months.
A cold-hardy citrus with a Woodlanders pedigree. Woodlanders has long led in offering citrus and citrus hybrids that stand outdoors beyond the usual citrus belt, and the calamandarin is one of the toughest. Likely a hybrid of a mandarin, Citrus reticulata, and a calamondin, the calamandarin blends easy-peeling, tangerine-like fruit with the cold tolerance that calamondin brings to the cross.
Woodlanders has long been a leader in offering citrus and citrus hybrids hardy well beyond the usual citrus belt, and the 'Razzlequat' is one of the odder and hardier of the lot. The plant is a cross between the Australian desert lime, Eremocitrus glauca, a tough, drought- and cold-tolerant native of the arid Australian interior, and, most likely, the familiar 'Meyer' lemon. From the desert lime parent come thorny, wiry branches, small narrow gray-green leaves, and a hardiness and drought tolerance rare among citrus; from the lemon come size and flavor.
A hardy evergreen ginger of unsettled name, this Alpinia forms dense, upright clumps of lance-shaped leaves that hold their fresh green right through the year in a mild climate, bringing a lush, tropical structure to the shade garden. In the warm months, bright yellow flower spikes rise above the foliage for an unexpected lift of color in deep shade.
Called Philippine violet, though neither Philippine nor a violet, Barleria cristata is a showy subtropical shrub that saves its display for the close of the year, opening dark blue-violet, trumpet-shaped flowers through late summer and autumn when much of the garden is winding down. A perennial in zones 8 and 9 and a four-to-six-foot shrub in zone 10, native to India and Myanmar.
Hardiness
Zones 8–11
Light
Full Sun / Part Shade
Height
4–6 ft.
Spread
24–30 in.
Bloom
Blue
Plant type
Shrub
Traditional use
respiratory support, topical applications, pain relief, general wellness
Native to Central and South America but naturalized across the tropics, this fast-growing shrub flowers not in spring or summer like a well-behaved plant but in autumn and into early winter, hanging great loose clusters of clear, saturated yellow at the ends of arching branches, each bloom built around curved stamens that give a vaguely butterfly-like silhouette. Cloudless Sulphur and Sleepy Orange butterflies find the shrub irresistible as both nectar source and larval host, and tend to arrive in numbers when the flowers open, a fact that either delights or mildly alarms a gardener, depending on how attached one is to the foliage. The caterpillars, for the record, are a vivid chartreuse and genuinely handsome. That is the bargain on offer.
'Buttercream' is a pale yellow-flowered form of Cassia bicapsularis, a softer, more refined take on that shrub's late-season show. Where the species blazes a saturated gold, 'Buttercream' carries clusters of cool, buttery cream-yellow flowers through autumn and into early winter, the same butterfly-like blooms at the ends of fast, arching branches, and the same draw for Cloudless Sulphur and Sleepy Orange butterflies that feed and breed on the plant.
September is a difficult month to write for. The garden is still technically in summer, but the light has shifted, lower and more golden, arriving at an angle that changes everything it touches. Cassia corymbosa reads that shift and answers it. While most summer shrubs are winding down, this one is only beginning, throwing dense corymbs of deep golden-yellow flowers at the branch tips with an enthusiasm that seems almost contrarian for the season.
Cestrum elegans is an erect to arching shrub carrying dense terminal clusters of narrow tubular flowers in a deep crimson that reads as reddish purple in some lights. Bloom arrives late in the growing season and continues until frost, which is precisely when a border needs something, and the shape of those flowers tells you who they are for: hummingbirds work them relentlessly. In the tropics the plants build into a woody shrub of seven feet and more. In zone eight the top freezes off each winter and returns from the root the following spring, reaching three to six feet in a season, which makes this behave less like a shrub and more like a very large perennial.
Cestrum elegans var. smithii is the soft, blush-rose form of the elegant cestrum, a fast, arching shrub that carries dense terminal clusters of slender tubular flowers in a warm pink, mildly fragrant in the evening and a steady draw for hummingbirds. Where the species runs to hot red-purple, this variety keeps things gentler, blooming from late spring well into fall, and year-round under glass.
Few plants announce themselves the way Cestrum nocturnum does, and never by daylight. Through the afternoon the shrub keeps to a quiet, almost ordinary green, the slender branches arching and half-climbing, the small tubular flowers furled and unremarkable. Then dusk arrives, the cream-green trumpets open, and the night-blooming jasmine releases a perfume so far-reaching that it carries across a whole garden on still, warm air.
The Ponderosa lemon is grown for spectacle as much as for the kitchen. The fruits are enormous, often two to four pounds each, thick-skinned and gloriously bumpy, hanging like green-gold cannonballs among the glossy leaves. For all the size, the flesh is tart, juicy, and true lemon in flavor, and works in any recipe a regular lemon would, with the novelty of a single fruit that can fill a hand.
The Rangpur is not truly a lime at all, but Indian gardeners have used the fruit as one for more than five hundred years. Citrus x limonia, an old natural hybrid of mandarin and citron, bears small, round, deep orange fruits that look like tangerines and taste fiercely sour, with the aromatic bite that makes a fine lime substitute for cooking, cocktails, and marmalade. In India the fruit goes by surkh nimboo, the red lime, prized for exactly that intense, tart juice.
Among the very first of the citranges, Citrus 'Rusk' dates to 1897, when Walter Swingle crossed a Ruby orange with the tough, cold-hardy trifoliate orange, Poncirus trifoliata, in the great effort to breed citrus that could take a freeze. The result is a vigorous, tall-growing, notably hardy tree, evergreen to semi-evergreen, and dense with the distinctive three-parted trifoliate leaves.
Named for Walter Tennyson Swingle, the pioneering citrus breeder who spent his career crossing tender oranges with the iron-hardy trifoliate orange, the Swingle citrumelo is among the toughest citrus hybrids ever raised. A cross of grapefruit, Citrus paradisi, and trifoliate orange, Poncirus trifoliata, this vigorous, thorny, semi-evergreen shrub or small tree carries fragrant white citrus blossoms in spring, followed by pear-shaped yellow fruits about the size of a large orange.
Woodlanders has long led in offering citrus and citrus hybrids hardy well beyond the usual citrus belt, and the Troyer citrange is a classic of the kind. A cross of the Washington navel orange and the inedible but iron-hardy trifoliate orange, Poncirus trifoliata, the Troyer was raised in 1909 under the direction of the great citrus breeder Walter Swingle, and later named for A. M. Troyer of Fairhope, Alabama, where the tree first bore fruit, a nice southern footnote for a hardy citrus.
Woodlanders has long led in offering citrus and citrus hybrids hardy well beyond the usual citrus belt, and U.S. 119 is one of the most refined of the group. A complex USDA hybrid, a citrumelo crossed back with a sweet orange, the tree runs one quarter trifoliate orange, one quarter grapefruit, and one half sweet orange, a pedigree chosen to keep the toughness of the trifoliate while pushing the fruit toward genuine quality.
Woodlanders has been a leader in offering a wide range of Citrus and Citrus hybrids which are hardy outdoors beyond the normal Citrus growing areas. This orange is actually an orange x tangelo hybrid. Tangelo is a grapefruit x mandarin hybrid. It was bred in Florida for cold hardiness but is not widely tested. It has however grown and been productive on the South Carolina coast. The fruit is said to be sweet and for marketing puroposes it is classified as an orange.
Woodlanders has been a leader in offering a wide range of Citrus and Citrus hybrids which are hardy outdoors beyond the normal Citrus growing areas. This hardy hybrid between the Naval Orange and the inedible but hardy Trifoliate Orange (Ponciris trifoliata)was created way back in 1909 under the direction of W.T. Swingle. It is now regarded as a sister seedling of 'Troyer' or it may indeed be the same as 'Troyer'. It is likewise a vigorous upright small tree with slender thorny branches, semi-evergreen foliage, white flowers, and abundant baseball size oranges that make a conversation piece plus a tasty and refreshing ade drink if juice is diluted and sweetened.
Woodlanders has been a leader in offering a wide range of Citrus and Citrus hybrids which are hardy outdoors beyond the normal Citrus growing areas. This hybrid between the Sour Orange and the Trifoliate Orange has great vigor and very nice foliage with mostly trifoliate leaves. Has flowered and fruited well in northern Alabama. This citrus is quite cold hardy but the plant with it's flowers and sizeable orange fruit may be better for show than anything else as Citradias are but not likely to very palatable.
