3 Tips on growing Heuchera

Rustic and rich in colour, Heuchera is a flowering plant provides texture and a range of hues, enhancing any garden. These tips will help you grow Heuchera with success.

Coming from humble plants in eastern and western North America, modern garden Heuchera are anything but plain. Showy hybrids often have deep-reddish bronze evergreen leaves marked with purple, such as the award-winning 'Palace Purple', or silver, such as 'Persian Carpet'.

Others, which are suitable for sunnier spots, have green leaves marbled with white sometimes blushed with pink.

In your care of Heuchera, keep in mind that they produce airy flower spikes studded with tiny, bell-shaped flowers in early summer. The flowers are pale and spindly on most dark-leaved cultivars, so many gardeners simply snipping them off. But keep the snippers sheathed if you choose varieties bred to produce a good bloom. After the flowers fade, snip out old stems to encourage a second glorious bloom.

• To help Heuchera thrive, they need exactly the right amount of light. Dark-leaved varieties scorch quickly when forced to bake in hot sun, so they are best grown in beds that get no more than four hours of direct sun.
• In shady gardens, where white-variegated plants are often prominent, dark-leaved Heuchera provide incomparable contrast.
• Heuchera that have green leaves can tolerate more sun, but they may still suffer, so monitor their welfare and move them to a shadier spot if leaf edges appear curled and dry at the end of a hot summer day.
• Light-textured, quick-draining soil enriched with compost is ideal for Heuchera. In soggy soil, these cliff-dwelling natives can succumb to root rot.
• Set container-grown plants at the same depth at which they were growing in their pots.
• Fill the hole around the root ball, firm the soil with your hands and water well. Never allow Heuchera to dry out completely or growth will come to a screeching halt.
• Heuchera have shallow roots, a trait that can make them heave out of the ground as it freezes and thaws in cold-winter areas.
• To prevent this, cover them with a fluffy mulch of evergreen boughs after the soil freezes hard.
• In climates where the soil does not stay frozen all winter, check plants several times and gently push them down if they seem to be popping out of place.

You need to pay special attention to care of your Heuchera at certain times of year. Take a look at these tips for spring time:

• Dig and divide Heuchera every three years in late winter or early spring.
• Dig up the clump and use a sharp knife to cut it into four sections.
• Pick away dead material with your fingers, and then immediately replant the divisions where you want them to grow. Heuchera are for the most part pest and disease free.
• Heuchera are related to strawberries and can fall prey to strawberry root weevils. The adults chew holes in the leaves and the larvae eat the roots. Apply beneficial nematodes to the soil according to package directions in mid-spring to control the larvae, which can reduce healthy plants to tumbleweeds.
• Hungry deer may also nibble the plants. If you find that leaves have been neatly nipped off, tuck a bar of deodorant soap into the planting to repel deer, or purchase a commercial repellent.

Growing and caring for Heuchera is straightforward. If you follow these tips, you’ll have a flourishing blossoming of Heuchera making your yard more beautiful for years to come.