Heart of the Garden

First of all, the name Echinacea comes from the Greek “echinos,” for hedgehog. That alone is reason enough to want a whole prairie full of these plants. Surely, they are named for the spiky, hedgehoggy-looking cones in their center.

Eastern purple coneflower (Echinacea purpurea) is native to all but nine states in the US. It’s very easy to grow as long as you have at least four hours of sun per day. It will tolerate low moisture, but needs good drainage. It has long taproot, so it does not like to be transplanted, but it will self seed if you do not deadhead (which you should not do anyway if you want to be part of the food web and feed the birds.) Coneflower has a clumping growth habit, so it will not spread laterally other than throwing out its small union of volunteers.

There have been many colorful hybrids popping up in garden centers in the past few years that range in color from pink to orange to yellow to white. Echinacea purpurea ‘Alba’ has a beautiful white flower, as I recently learned “alba” means “white.” When you read “rubra” in a plant name, it will most likely refer to a plant that is red. Who says Latin is a dead language?