Reputedly one of the world's oldest living plants, these amazing, evergreen, subtropical tree-like plants bear just a few branches of lance-shaped leaves, often crowded towards the tips. Mature plants produce fronds of fragrant greenish-white flowers, which are followed by attractive clusters of bright orange berries, each of which holds a sizeable, very hard, pearl-like seed. When the bark is damaged it exudes thick, red, blood-like sap, hence one of its common names! Making statuesque specimens in warmer countries, these are also superb, highly-valued, expensive pot plants elsewhere. It is ... Learn More

The tasty fruits of the exotic "PITAHAYA" cactus can be grown as an ornamental plant indoors, or outside in hot countries, where it will put forth large fragrant white flowers. These in turn produce an almost endless supply of attractive, grapefruit-sized red fruits, with numerous, tiny, rather fascinating, green-tipped red 'wings'. When the soft, rubbery, inedible skin is cut open, the attractively contrasting, delicately-flavoured white flesh, studded with tiny edible black seeds is revealed, rather similar to "Kiwi Fruits". These incredibly healthy fruits contain generous servings of vita ... Learn More

These showy, bright pink, leathery skinned fruit have a sweet seed-speckled pulp inside, which has acclaimed super food powers. They grow on vine-like cacti which produce aerial roots that allow them to cling to surfaces, creating a creeping, climbing habit. A fast-growing crop, the plants can produce for more than 20 years once established. Chinese legend claims they were created thousands of years ago by a dragon in battle who blew a burst of fire containing the fruit. ... Learn More

Whatever next! Can you believe a strawberry with yellow flowers. And this is the rare variegated-leaved form. Attractive red berries (edible, although pippy, but loved by birds) and very similar to alpine strawberries, are produced all summer, on a creeping evergreen carpet. Perfect hanging over a wall or rockery, or as an attractive slowly creeping ground cover. ... Learn More

Can you believe a strawberry with yellow flowers. Attractive red berries loved by birds and very similar looking to alpine strawberries, are produced all summer, on a creeping evergreen carpet. This is the more-vigorous form of the variegated form and is perfect hanging over a wall or on a rockery, where it will stifle all low-lying weeds. ... Learn More

A vigorous scrambler, perfect for covering an evergreen shrub, with dazzling, pillar-box red, tubular flowers, produced freely from June to October in multi-flowered trusses. Makes a hardy overwintering tuber, but flowers first year from seed. ... Learn More

A vigorous scrambler, perfect for covering an evergreen shrub, with red, orange or yellow tubular flowers, produced freely from June to October in multi-flowered trusses. Makes a hardy overwintering tuber, but flowers first year from seed. ... Learn More

Thick, stout stems carry bunches of pretty, creamy-apricot-pink flowers holding bright red stamens, the terminal anthers coated with striking sky blue pollen. During its first year it forms a woolly, prostrate, silver rosette of leaves. The following year arises the impressive spire of flowers, carrying numerous side branches. This rare and seldom-offered gem is a native of mountains and high areas in southern Spain, Algeria, Morocco, and Portugal. Very few seeds collected. ... Learn More

This is possibly the most lusted-after plant in our gardens every May and June, and is a fabulous cross we made between the superb Echium wildpretii with its 1.2 metre, fat red spike and the giant blue Echium pininana. The result is a 35 centimetres wide, tapering tower of delicate pink flowers which are like a lighthouse attracting bees, butterflies and other pollinating insects. Although most plants will be pink, the odd variant colour will always appear, but all are very desirable as our bees also pollinate the many plants we grow here.... so you may get the odd surprise! The odd variant h ... Learn More

The amazing show-stopper, Echium wildpretii, is one of the world's most impressive plants with its 3 to 4 foot spike of raspberry-red flowers erupting from a swan's nest of thin, grey hairy leaves. But it can sometimes succumb to frost and winter wet. So we back-crossed it with one of its bigger and tougher children, "Pink Fountain", itself a cross between the relatively hardy Echium pininana and Echium wildpretii! And this unbelievable 4 to 6 foot spectacle was the result. Fat, bee-magnet spikes are thickly crowded with dark pink or strawberry-red flowers, and blue-pollen-powdered anthers. I ... Learn More

Russia and Eastern Europe is the home of this uncommon and unusual plant which is probably the most attractive of all dwarf echiums. Amazingly it is not only bone-hardy but also, unbelievably, reliably perennial! Many short stout stems carry whorls of long lance-shaped dark green leaves, and a long succession of foot-long spikes of stunning, bright crimson flowers with prominent protruding red anthers. ... Learn More

An unusually large flowered form of the "Chilean Firebush" collected as seed on the banks of Lago Cucao, Chiloe Island, during our 1994 Chile Expedition (RB94051). As this seed has wild diversity you will find that the clusters of tubular flowers that appear in early summer vary from crimson to an unforgettable bright red. Many plants grown in the UK are cuttings originally from the same plant, but this is new blood! ... Learn More

This new and intriguing annual produces a great profusion of sprays of fluffy, flame-scarlet-red tassels, blooming on the tops of tall, thin stems that sway in the breeze all summer long from June to September. It is perfect where you need a splash of colour in your garden, where it adds texture, graceful form and movement. It is also excellent for cutting to brighten up your living room. ... Learn More

This absolutely diminutive, rather rare, summer-flowering perennial is found in the alpine screes and rocky areas from 900–1800m altitude in the mountains of New Zealand's South Island from Nelson to Arthur's Pass where it makes a prostrate creeping carpet of tiny succulent leaves spangled with almost stemless, pretty pink flowers. Later, the curious, erect seed pods are formed, from which the tiny gossamer seed-parachutes are soon blown aloft, but rarely to become a pest! ... Learn More

Slowly creeping growths push up short stems, clothed with small leaves, topped in July with spikes of red-infused flowers with brownish sepals around an intricate white and yellow lip. The overall effect is entrancing. It will do best in full sun in a seasonally wet or damp soil, which for best results should be alkaline. This lovely hardy orchid is native to Europe, Turkey, the Caucasus, West and East Siberia, and Central Asia. Please be aware that these plants are very slow indeed to germinate, but when established are easy to grow and very long-lived as they spread by underground runners. ... Learn More