What are your current plant obsessions?

[IdaPolly]

I've recently started a slight obsession with dianthus/pinks flowers. They smell so nice and there are some really pretty varieties. What are your plant obsessions? I like seeing the people on Gardeners World who have an obsession with a flower. I remember people with peony, iris, Sweet pea and daffodil obsessions.

The humble lavender. Just love it.

@irridium bonsai wisteria

I’m a serial obsessive. Once it was honeysuckles, so i now have 2 “proper hoeneysuckles” flowering at different times, an orange flowered one, two different evergreen ones, two bush ones (winter flowering and a red flowered one) and a boring Lonicera nitida. Then it was acers from seed, so I now have two different snake barks, a paperbark, and a number of dwarf, and have given several away. Another time it was Lathyrus (pea) species and I met the metallic blue L sativus and the acid yellow/green L chloranthus. Most recently, rose species from seed. Interesting to see the variety of prickles, stipules, leaflet numbers, stem colour etc. Three are different species of sweet briar, so they are definite keepers.

I have a 16 year old Sarah Bernhardt peony, and at the last count I have 40 buds on it (obsessive much?) I absolutely love the glorious over the top show the plant gives.
Although I have recently come across a Colonel Owen Cousins peony, which is seriously amazing.

My other obsession is my Extravaganza oriental lillies, not so much with the plant itself but watching out for the damn red Lily beetle that will annihilate a healthy plant.
I spray with Neem oil which does seem to keep them at bay, but I can't help checking when I am in the garden.

Last year I was raving over Russian Sage, it was magnificent so I might have to get more this year.

I love sweet peas and snapdragons but this year it's the salvias that keep catching my attention in the garden centre. Their leaves smell so good.
I like all the different varieties of mint too.

Thanks @Geneticsbunny , I'm not giving up. Meanwhile I enjoy the ones blooming in front gardens now, such big, vivid blooms

Peonies, tree peony and bearded iris. Lucky to move into a house with them and previously I’d only loved roses so it’s a new relationship!

It’s beautiful but yes very slow growing

Oh my goodness that is absolutely stunning, I’ve never seen anything like it. I recently bought my first acer, I need to read up a bit more about how to look after it, I think.

Nemesia. I've got a Wisley vanilla that smells like Playdoh and flowered from May-October last year. This year I've planted as many different seed varieties as I could find and I'm hoping they all chivvy up and do the same.

The iris sibiricas are lovely too (though a lot more delicate looking) and may suit.I've got some in clay soil in a quite shady area which are gorgeous at the moment. But you can grow them in pots - as they're often used as marginal pond plants, by way of experiment I put some of my expanding clump into compost in plastic pots which I hadn't drilled holes into. They get totally waterlogged - mini bog gardens! - and flower beautifully on my patio.

Thanks @ErrolTheDragon I will Google some iris nurseries and have a browse. This is my favourite thread for ages.

I'm obsessed with Heucheras! I'm a gardening novice and they've been my biggest success so far. I've got loads of different colours now.

@Geneticsbunny I agree about iris sibirica for clay/moist soils - they are delicate and gorgeous en masse. You could grow bearded iris in pots or raised beds filled with a free draining growing medium provided you have a sunny spot for them. If in pots miniature tall bearded (MTB) irises are like scaled down versions of tall bearded irises, or border/intermediate/short bearded iris would work too. The MTBs are particularly lovely though. Just use loads of grit mixed in with your soil/compost mix, place in the sunniest spot you have and job's a good un. The downside of bearded irises is they look so manky when they go dormant after flowering, so having some in pots would be good as you could put them out of sight!

Geums. Can't get enough of them at the moment. So cheery, prolific and easy to grow. I bought a couple of Scarlet Tempest last year which did beautifully in a patio pot, then on a whim early this spring Ipulled them up, divided them (ripped them apart tbh) and bunged them in a border. They have romped away bigger and brighter than ever. Fantastic flowers.

Also mildly obsessed with salvia Hot Lips and erigeron karvianskanus. I would have them everywhere if I could.

Roses. I have about 30, but can’t stop buying them. I’m also beginning to be obsessed with hellebores, and Phlomis. Those whorls trigger something in me. Everyone of my gardening friends thinks phlomis is dull or even, gasp, ugly, but I love it.I love shrubs, especially the common easy ones like kerria, dogwood, St. John’s wort. I get sad when new gardeners start by ripping them out.I love good groundcover plants. I don’t get geums at all, probably because my gardens full of wood avens, the weed version. I kill lavender, no matter how hard I try to care for it, and perennials that need staking can just get in the bin.

Freesias, hollyhocks and foxgloves at the moment.

My hollyhocks and foxgloves are dying to be planted out. I bought some pastel freesia bulbs last year and stored them away. Too well apparently because I've no idea where the buggers are and I really want them back.

I love my Forever Purple Heuchera. It has lasted well outdoors through winter too

I bought my first geum this year. Queen of Orange. Can't wait to see the flowers. I saw a beautiful one on GW the other week. It was sort of golden orange with a hint of green. They didnt say what it was though

I love my light pink St Ethelburga rose. The scent is gorgeous. I have a newer Desdemona too. Apparently The Poet's Wife smells of lemon

Zinnias.

They are annuals so have to start from scratch every year, but they grow and flower in the most fascinating way, and the colours are extraordinary. They are like something out of a sci fi film.

Unfortunately the slugs and snails love them as much as I do, so they get munched like nobody's business.

My favourite rose that I have is probably the Generous Gardener, but I really really want the Queen of Sweden. Sadly she’s far too refined for my wilderness.

I absolutely love my erysimum bowles mauve - so pretty and longer flowering than anything I have in my garden (usually Feb to November). I have a few dotted around my garden but they are doing better in some areas than others (I have very heavy clay soil which I have been trying to improve gradually over the 10 years I have lived here but it is taking a while and it doesn't do well in the very heavy clay spots).

Wow! do you know its name?