Leptinella x Platt's Black (Ground Cover) (Stepables)

I bought some of these little guys to use as some ground cover. I have never found a plant softer. When I looked it up online it mentioned up to zone 7. Is anyone familiar with this plant and know anything about how well it spreads?
Thanks Vicki

Joy Creek says zones 4-7. I have killed it once, it needs a little more care (aka water) while it's getting established. Doesn't like too much hot sun, but needs light.

I saw this well-established at the Bellevue Botanical Gardens a couple weeks ago. It was in a woodland setting (lots of light, but no direct sunlight) and I'm sure it wasn't protected at all in winter. It had spread to an area of about 3 ft by 2 ft.

Katie! How in the world can you kill leptentilla? It spreads extremely well, (you may have to keep it in check), and is hardy as old boots! does go brown in severe drought conditions, but just give it a little drink and whoosh it is back. Has absolutely darling little tiny faerie sized blossom. I like it, and you are absolutely right - soft as anything.

Grows very easily from cuttings.

Well, I must have a special talent. I think I let it get too dry under a cedar before it was completely established.

How do you take a cutting of leptinella? Or is leptentilla something else?

Platt's black - have 3.
Western Red Cedars are not kind to most anything that likes moisture, but rocks do well!

Kathy - I must get together with you in the next 2-3 weeks. I am finding all kinds of fun stuff for your new areas to be: forgot what all is out there in the ground!
Also - we neeeeeeed to do a nursery run or two.
Left a message for the tour reservation at Dunn's, also. Hope that the weather turns warmer so that more is up & reaching for the sun.

(I've probably mis-spelled it) - As it spreads, it puts out runners - just tease them up and plant on a stretch of it - just make sure it has little nodes (the little swollen jointy bits) for root growth. sounds like cedars really are asocial in terms of sharing their growing space - shame on them, they must learn manners! Although when you are that big.......

http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/91364/

This message was edited Mar 14, 2008 7:52 AM

Thanks for the link, Laurie. I'm trying it again this year in a little moister spot. Hopefully I'll have a good-sized spot before too long.

Keep us informed - always worth keeping a thread of notes on what works where.

Well, I'm rapidly working my way up to being master gardener as I'm accumulating quite a history of what doesn't work. :-) At least those tend to stay in my head. LOL

what an interesting approach for a dissertation that would be - almost everyone chooses to write on new discoveries that work - to do new discoveries that don't work will be a first, I am sure!! 'Brave and interesting approach' the examiners will report - 'a woman with unique insight' the reviews will acclaim - go for it Katie!

I can't claim to have come up with that one myself - I heard (or read) somebody once assert that you can't be a seasoned gardener until you've killed at least 1,000 plants.

But yes, I guess I could write about pitfalls - I know them all too well. And there's the humor aspect of the stories, as in critically eyeing someone else's mistake with the reassuring that I "would never make such an error" and then going home a repeating it in another form.

There's nothing like the following year, when you realize that you didn't learn from their mistakes and hence were doomed to repeat them. The biggest is planting too close to (choose one) a) the trellis, b) the foundation, c) the tree (that is also growing), d) the sidewalk, e) another plant.

I'm sure that nobody else has ever done that. LOL

Or even better - I was wheelbarrowing manure/compost this afternoon, trying to get a job (well, three jobs) done today. Full barrow, extra bucket of wood chips on top, spade sticking up over the entire lot - sharp incline which dips away in two directions to be manuevered - and as I approached I thought 'this is stupid, I'm going to come a cropper', and kept going - and as I watched the barrow twist one way, me trying to right it and picturing my skidding across the rough concrete face down - I jumped and tangled in the handles of the barrow barking my shins - and ended up bottom down and covered in manure. B#gger.

And then I went and over loaded it again, just daring it to happen twice! Very slow learning curve.

(oops, Katie, psst, I think we have gone off piste again - have you noticed that poor Vicki has left the room? I think we should say something plantlike to get her to come back).

This message was edited Mar 14, 2008 8:03 PM

Tell me that sheer brute force and will won out over discretion and you made it the second time.

P.S. Adding that to my list, "Coming a cropper". What's the derivation of that? :-)

I don't know - I will have to look it up in my slang book. I will report tomorrow - off to eat/drink and be merry (not that I'm not merry right now, but I am a bit hungry).

I did plant some Brass Buttons about 3 years ago (not sure if it was Platte's Black) between patio "stones"--really concrete slabs from an old driveway. I did this because they were listed as steppable and full sun o.k. on the plant tag. They looked lovely in the Spring, looked brown and dry in the Summer, though still pretty from close up, and perked back up when the rains came again. I love their cute, little yellow button flowers. Since then they have crawled their way through the patio cracks into conditions that are a bit more optimal for them, namely the bed on the side of the patio. They have entwined themselves in with the Elfin Thyme, an effect which I enjoy at the moment. I get the sense that they could keep going and take over, but I like them where they are so far. We'll see if I am still happy if they do as the Pink Panda strawberries did (run amok), though they are much smaller and may be a nice underplanting for perennials. Hopefully they will not choke things out and become a nuisance. They seem easy to pull up. My brother likes them. We call them the little ferny things.

I'll take pictures tomorrow if I have a moment (Been doing the report-card-writing marathon, and also am going to a memorial service tomorrow for a friend who passed away last weekend. Therefore, I have had a hard time concentrating on the task at hand. The mind keeps drifting)

Holly - I'm very sorry about your friend. I can imagine that loss has left you somewhat distracted.

Thank you, Katie. You are so thoughtful of other people. It has been a rough week. I got my kid to school late every day (for his WASL tests) so he missed some of the instructions. He was going to take the bus so I could sleep in, but slept right through the alarm set on the loudest setting. I gave up on that and decided we all needed the extra half hour of sleep driving in allows. Somehow, I just couldn't sleep anyway, and had weird dreams. Funny scramble of emotions too...I found myself angry that she (my friend) never got to eat the strawberries which I planted for her last month, grouchy in all the meetings I had to go to today, and laughing hysterically at somebody's joke in a technology training class I attended.

Oh, Holly - how difficult that must be . . . {{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{{Holly}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}}

Holly
Glad to see you enjoy the stepables. Very sorry about your friend. I hope you'll find some distraction in your gardening.
Vicki

Thank you for the hugs, Carole. I've sure been enjoying your rainbow pictures on the other thread. You have a way of lifting up other people when you are going through such a tough time yourself.

You are right, Vicki, planting something and looking up at the trees and sky is about the best thing a person can do to calm the mind and soul.

Amen

Laurie, I hope you have recovered from your adventure with the wheelbarrow and its precious contents. Many of us have had similar events in our gardening lives. Its all part of the quest for an abundance of natural fertilizer for our plant, for whom of course we will go to any length. :o)

Hope it's possible to see them in this picture. I have not figured out the close up shot very well. They are just putting up little buds.

And underneath a shrub: note they were not planted there, but went through the thyme to get into this bed and spread out several feet (last Summer) and have started up again with a gradual advance this Spring.

Holly - That is beautiful. I don't think I've ever seen it filled in like that. So the area gets lots of sun - how dry does it get in the summer? Do you have to keep it watered once it gets established.

They do look really nice right now, as it's their favorite weather, cool and moist. I have very little but sun at my place, except for behind the house and under the cherry tree, areas that I have not developed into garden (yet). I have been watering that bed in the summer, because I was trying to establish some shrubs and perennials there, but it does get hot in the summer as it is western exposure and right by the cement patio. I'm not sure how the Brass Buttons will do there later on.

That's helpful. I'll make sure to keep them in the right environment this time and see if I can't be as successful as you have.

I really do like it. Nice placement (even if it did help itself).

And yes, I am well recovered from the manure dousing - and no I did not repeat the dumping (me and stuff) on the second go - which means I am feeling invincible, and imagining it won't happen again, and consequently will load it even higher, go faster, and over we go! Lesson continually unlearned.

That Brass Buttons is very pretty like you have it between the stones. I tried it on the north side of my house under Rhody's and it struggled for about two years and disappeared. But I do have stepping stones on the southeast side and I'm going to see if I can duplicate your sucess.

That sounds like it should work, WW. Enough sun but not that totally hot afternoon baking that mine get (which causes them to brown up in July and August).

Here it is, traveling around a phormium on its way through any available soil. I hope this will be alright for the phormium, which has not taken off like I had hoped. It wasn't doing very well before the leptinella gave it a root blanket, so we'll see how it goes this summer.

MHF - when you say browned up - crispy brown? In full sun the leptinella does go completely dark -

I have a small creeping fern that spreads all over under my Rhody's by the pond. The fronds are about 5'" long and it lies very low to the ground. Nelly Barlow columbine come up through it. I like it a lot.

Sounds really nice WW, its coming up to columbine season - so don't forget to take a photo, I'd love to see the combination.

Holly gave me some of the Platt's Black at Pixy's work party. I planted it in the fairie garden and it is doing quite well!

Hey - Rach - a picture of the faerie garden?

I went to take a picture of it this morning and the camera battery was dead. It's charging right now, will take a picture in awhile.

It will be a while before the columbine bloom here. They are only showing leaves now. I live over 500' above sea level across the canal from the Olympic Mountain and we are about two weeks behind the rest of the world in seasonal splendor. I will take pictures. I am taking pictures. I will be learning soon how to post them.
Katie59 the plants arrived today in good shape. Thank you so very much. I will look forward to them blooming.

I'm with you on that, Willow still have them just coming up. My large Daffs have not bloom yet the buds are there just haven't opened. Just the mini Daffs that have opened. I can see new growth on the Hostas barely sticking out out of the ground, Spring is coming.

Creeping, slowly creeping.

Are you getting the wind like we are? been cold and windy here.