Sedums

September Sedum Show

| Flower Roberts

I really admire the sedums for holding up to the August heat and then blooming afterwards.

I only water my small sedums in pots and troughs. The big plants in the yard are on their own.

I have three types with known hybrid names. The rest have been passed along or given to me without identification. These three are hard-working bloomers.

The hot pink one is aptly named ‘Brilliant’ because it really is showy.

‘Brilliant’ sedum

The more muted salmon, darker hybrid is ‘Matrona.’

‘Matrona’ sedum

The one I have had for several decades is ‘Autumn Joy.’

This plant is two-toned because the deer ate half of the shoots earlier in the summer. It recovered nicely.

‘Autumn Joy’ sedum

These three are covered with bees, wasps and butterflies all day long.

Their flowers are important to pollinators who still need food after most flowers have faded.

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Grandma Sedum

| Flower Roberts

I shared a post about this sedum back in June.

I nicknamed  it “Mama Sedum” because of all the babies on the leaf margins.

A fellow garden blogger, Rusty Duck, kindly supplied its proper name Bryophyllum daigremontianum.

It can also be called Kolancho daigremontianum, Mexican Hat plant or Mother-of-Thousands.

We will be calling it “Grandma Sedum” now because the plantlets have gone and propagated right there on their mama.

This is a first here. The babies have had babies.

Kids are in such a hurry to grow up these days!

At least get off your poor mama before reproducing you little parasites!

Good thing this sedum cannot survive our winters.

It is probably a big pest down in the deep south.

But I love it here in Zone 7.  It can be a great grandma for all I care.

Congratulations Grandma!

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No Sedum? You Need’um.

| Flower Roberts

In September most flowers are drying up and needing dead-heading.

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Not the sedums. They have been slowly stretching out their clusters of green buds.

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As the tiny flowers open the entire head blushes with color.

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You don’t need to look to know if they are blooming, you can HEAR it.

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Each colorful head is full of all kinds of bumble bees, honey bees, wasps, butterflies, moths and lightening bugs.

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It’s like a party on every plant.

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Another Mother

| Flower Roberts

I have posted on another Mother-of-Thousands,

This one is also called Mother-of-Millions, Alligator Plant and Mexican Hat Plant.

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It also goes by several scientific/genus names; Bryophyllum, Crassulaceae or Kolanchoe.

Even the species/specific epithet may change from daigremontiana to pinnata.

No wonder it had no label when I purchased it from a greenhouse.

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The leaflets on the mama leaves are held by tiny pink “spoons” along the edges.

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Some grow roots before they drop off, but most do not.

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They do not get far from the mama plant.

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Cute, but crowded.

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Sedums in September

| Flower Roberts

While the rest of my garden is shutting down and drying up in North Carolina,

the sedums are just starting to put on a show.

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These flowers are the star attraction for bees, bugs and butterflies now.

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I have quite a collection of these not-so-thirsty plants

due to my past profession as a garden artist.

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Sedums thrive in “stone trough” planters made of hypertufa.

This is a mixture of Portland cement, vermiculite, sand and peat moss.

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Sedum lineare ‘Variegatum’

My sedums survived this dry summer much better than my “water-loving” plants.

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Autumn Joy sedum

Now that the temperature is finally dipping down a bit,

the sedums are putting out their lovely heads of tiny flowers.

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Sedum spectable “Brilliant”

Many types have pink blooms, but some have yellow

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Sedum kamtschaticum

or even white.

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Frosty Morn stonecrop

September is the month for sedums in the south.

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