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Got chocolate in your garden? There’s good news for lovers of chocolate. Not only has it been proven that eating chocolate is good for your health, but chocolate-colored plants are also an easy way to add flavor and color to your landscape.
Here’s some sweet tips for adding chocolate to your own landscape:
For just a little chocolate:
Chocolate Chip ajuga: A sweet groundcover
Very easy to grow, this ground-hugging perennial does not get out of control like regular ajuga and sports rich, chocolate-brown foliage capped by lacy blue flower spikes each spring.
Chocolate Chip ajuga only spreads 2 or 3 feet after a couple of years so I use it in container gardens.
The dark foliage looks especially nice spilling over the edge of a cream- or light-colored pot and this ajuga won’t smother its neighbors.
It makes an especially nice statement when combined with the silver leaves of Dusty Miller.
As an added bonus, the chocolate foliage stays looking great all winter long – and it looks especially good on a snowy day when a nice pot of chocolate really warms the heart.
Chocolate Cosmos: To perfume your garden with the smell of cocoa.
Grown for its fabulous fragrance, this cosmos (Cosmos atrosanguineus) has attractive deep-red flowers that appear in late summer and early fall. I’ve had problems growing this semi-hardy plant before because I failed to respect its demand for quick-draining soil. The solution is to grow it in a large pot, use lightweight potting soil and don’t overwater. If you have only a balcony or small patio and still like the idea of chocolate in the garden, this is the plant for you.
Chocolate Beech Tree: To use chocolate as a backdrop for drama
Okay, chocolate does not grow on trees here in Western Washington and even though the dark foliage of the purple or copper beech trees do look a bit like chocolate, there are no beech varieties with chocolate in the name. But adding any tree with rich, deep foliage to your landscape gives the garden an instant shot of color contrast. We live in a state of perpetual green with shades of gray. Adding a tree with foliage that reminds you of a Hershey bar provides a backdrop for dramatic color combinations. Ring your chocolate tree with white-blooming Glacier azaleas, or plant the variegated green-and-white Pieris japonica nearby. It’s all about the contrast. Once you have the dark foliage as a foil for light-colored plants, your landscape will shine with light on even the grayest of days.
Fun stuff Laura. I love learning about new plants/trees to try.
Gardening is a perpetual learning process, isn’t it?
Another goodie to include in a container is the herb mint — the chocolate variety!
[Reply]
MsWonka replied: — February 14th, 2010 @ 1:48 PM
I didn’t know there’s a Chocolate variety of the mint plant. Interesting. I wonder if it tastes a bit like Chocolate or just have a Chocolaty brown color in it’s foliage?
That is really cool. I usually kill everything that I try to grow. This year I am really going to try to grow plants and take care of them.
[Reply]
MsWonka replied: — February 14th, 2010 @ 1:50 PM
Hi Jessica. Try to grow wildflowers. They are pretty hardy (easy to grow) and some varieties are even perennial (come back each year w/o re-seeding).
This is interesting, and good timing. I am reading up on new plants to add to the yard this year. And since my dogs are all of the Chocolate variety I can plant in their honor.
[Reply]
MsWonka replied: — February 23rd, 2010 @ 7:35 PM
Hey, that’s great! I have found some more Chocolate plants just this last weekend. Never thought about Chocolate plants until I started this blog. Thanks for stopping by.