This Amethyst Dream centaurea adds a new spin on the blue cornflowers or Bluet’s we normally see here in Ohio.
Centaurea montana
I found this Amethyst Dreams growing in the trial gardens at Franklin Park Conservatory this fall. It had vivid purple blooms with silvery green foliage. 
Their vivid purple blooms are lovely but I am rather fond of the the native grown light blue Cornflowers that grow along the roadsides and fields here in Ohio in the summer from late June to August. (minus the litter of course)
Centaurea cyanus Cornflower or Bluet
They are sprayed to keep them out of the fields now but they thrive and multiply in the worst conditions of dry gravel, clay soil and salt along our roads here in the hills.
I am sure most people around here consider them weeds but I love the powdery blue blooms.
Do you consider it a weed or a native flower in your area?
Happy Gardening,
Lona
I also have three tickets left for the Central Ohio Garden Show which starts this weekend. If you would like them please email me your address.
13 comments:
Definitely not a weed to me - I love them
Hmm. Weed or flower. The "perennial" conundrum. The flower is lovely and reminds me of fine embroidery.
I scatters some Cornflower seeds for my septic drain field/meadow. I hope they grow/ reseed/ and thrive!
I bet the cornflowers would love my yard because you did say they grow in dry clay soil didn't you. The photo is lovely with all of them in bloom along the road.
I wish the weeds that grew alongside the roads here were as pretty as these blue cornflowers!
Well it's native to Europe so I guess I'd classify it as a weed but it's lovely. And I'm sure the insects don't care where it came from!
They don't grow along the roadsides much in central NC, mostly in gardens.
Sounds like the cornflower would be perfect for my garden!! I love blue blooms. Pretty post, Lona.
Lona girl have you ordered that "Ketchup & Mustard" rose yet ?.. you better order that daylily too because I just know you are going to love mine when it starts blooming and you see the flowers !
Aren't these sweet little roadside flowers !
We have the blue chicory growing on the sides of roads and it is so pretty plus native rocket and Goldenrod .. Did you see the new centaurea montana ‘Black Sprite’? it is amazing and has that wow factor for punctuation in the garden .. I almost got it this year but I still have another list of garden plants to post about .. ouch ! LOL
Joy
It's Chicory, right? I absolutely love it and the Queen Anne's Lace that bloom along the roadsides. Here in Northern Illinois they always appear in July. It wouldn't be summer without them.
Lona, I love your blog's header collage! Beautiful! So cheerful!
The second picture shows such wonderful purple color - awesome!
So lovely...I've always wanted to grow one of these...and now that I know there is a purple one, I'm sold! I adore that pic of them growing along the roadside. Back in Nebraska, where I grew up, we had a similar situation, except it was wild chicory...the road crews would cut it to the ground in mid-summer, but it would respond by springing right back up to 3'...and would blooms gloriously. It looked, for all the world, like a bright blue cloud floated along the side of the highway for miles!
Lona I grow the Montana though I have to keep it within bounds as it would take over the border and I dare not let it go to seed. I love it's vivid blue flowers and I've seen a white coloured bloom before but never purple. I don't grown the bluet - is it chicory? as that is one herb I have on my wanted list to grow this year.
Nice... needed tis post.
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