More Plants for "The Shambles" inspired by Northern NSW

Our accommodation, Lindsey House Armidale.

On a fascinating tour with a group from Heritage Roses Australia we all enjoyed visiting gardens in Casino, Grafton, Glen Innes and Tenterfield in early October.

We stayed on after the group returned to Queensland and enjoyed whale watching from our cottage verandah at Woolgoolga. At the wonderful Coffs Harbour (Northern NSW) Botanic Gardens we identified some of our unknowns from their displays

After a look at Dorrigo, and the National Park  for the first time we headed to Armidale for the national Conference of the Australian Garden History Association. The selected gardens and homestead were of course inspirational, so we couldn't help buying yet more plants to add to "The Shambles".

These have been duly added with some thought for colour and position. We now all wait for rain.

From Casino            Salix matsudana (Twisted Willow) named for Japanese Botanist Sadahisa Matsuda. A realatively short lived tree which is invasive near water courses, Northern China and Korea

From Glen Innes     Centranthus ruber (Red Valerian) Perennial from Mediterranean Central Shrub Garden

Euonymous japonicus aureo-marginatus (Golden Variegated Japanese Laurel) Central Shrub garden

Escallonia rubra "Crimson Spires) evergreen shrubs with glossy, leathery, toothed leaves, sometimes sticky, and 5-petalled white, pink or red flowers in terminal racemes or panicles in summer and early autumn South America Eastern Border garden

Physocarpus opulifolius purpurea (Atlantic Ninebark) eastern North America on rocky hillsides and banks of streams as well as in moist thickets, especially in counties south of the Missouri River .It is fast-growing, insect- and disease-resistant, and drought-tolerant. Central Shrub garden rel, to Spiraea cantoniensis.

Osmanthus heterophyllus purpureus (False Holly) 'Purpureus' is a compact evergreen shrub to 4m, with leathery, spined, holly-like leaves, dark coppery-bronze when young, and small, fragrant white flowers in late summer and autumn China Eastern Border gardens

Abelia schumannii syn. A. longituba  native to central China. It is a semi-evergreen shrub growing to 2 m (7 ft) tall by 3 m (10 ft) broad. Pink flowers with red calyces are produced in late summer and autumn. The species is named after the German botanist Karl Moritz Schumann. In cultivation it requires a sheltered, south-facing aspect. Central Shrub garden

Michael Simpson