Hello Master Gardener, can you suggest some white perennial native flowers for a west facing area of the garden. Am a beginner gardener and absolutely overwhelmed by all the info. The 2 beds are 4′ long by 2.5″ deep, separated by a small waterfall.
Very many thanks for any info.
Hello, Gardener – We’d love to make some recommendations for white native plants but we’ll need more information about your space before we can do so. At a minimum, we need the amount of light the area receives (full sun: 6 hours of direct sun/day, part shade: 3-4 hours per day, shade: 1-2 hours per day) and the moisture profile of the area (dry, medium, wet). A bit more information about your garden bed would be helpful too. Are there any existing plants in the beds that you plan to keep. What are you looking for in terms of plant heights?
I do have some suggestions about how you can easily identify some appropriate native plants yourself. Lorraine Johnson’s book, ‘100 Easy-to-Grow Native Plants for Canadian Gardens’ contains some quick reference charts with plants for specific conditions. For example, one chart shows drought-tolerant plants, another plants for deep shade. In addition, each chart has small thumb nail photos of the plant so you can easily see the colour. Each of the plants has a detailed description elsewhere in the book so you can check out the height and width of the plant, some of it’s growing habits and good plant companions. It’s a great resource (now in it’s third edition) which I’ve made use of for many years. The book is available from the Toronto Public Library.
The Toronto Master Gardener’s web site also has good resources. Our Gardening for Habitat – Native Plants of Interest guide (link below) provides a chart of early, mid-season and late season blooming plants to ensure a consistent season of bloom. The chart is broken down by light requirements and identifies plants that tolerate moist conditions. It does not include bloom colour so a little research would be required on your part. – perhaps a cross-reference with Lorraine’s book.
For future reference, I’m including a link to another of our guides that outlines all of our native plant references, information available from the City of Toronto and links to native plant/seed sources.
I hope you enjoy making plant selections using these resources. Contact us again with more information if you’d like some recommendations