Potentilla x tonguei

Description

Potentilla x tonguei is a great ground-covering garden plant. It is less often seen than more well-known shrubby potentillas but is none the less attractive for it – indeed we love it for its cheery peach-orange flowers that are lively without being glaring, as well as its attractive, scrambling foliage that like other potentiallas has something of the look of a strawberry plant, with its small, toothed and striated leaves. The leaves are unusual in this cultivar in that the underside is almost silvery, given the plant an added texture and interest even before the flowers arrive in mid summer. When the flowers do arrive they pop up in a punchy, slightly chaotic way along the scrambling arms of the plant, each flower a soft, sunset-peach to the outside fading into a deep red to black at the centre.

These established, garden-ready plants have been grown in peat-free compost at our nursery in Cornwall and are supplied in two-litre containers. They will grow to an ultimate height of just 15-20cm (6-8 inches) but will scramble around, covering an area of up to around 50cm (1 and a half to 2 feet).