Page 8 THE SAUGUS ADVOCATE – FriDAy, JUly 25, 2025 Saugus Gardens in the Summer Here’s what’s blooming in town this week to make your walks more enjoyable By Laura Eisener L in Bell’s gardens in the front and back of her home, planted entirely in containers, provide color and fragrance from late spring through mid-fall and attract a wide range of pollinators. It offers a bright spot in a mostly green neighborhood and includes several intriguing species not commonly seen in local landscapes. After moving in recently and being inspired by Lin’s garden, the Reid family next door was inspired to put a container of plants near their own front door, too. Mexican cigar flower (Cuphea ignea) is thriving in the porch railing planter on Lin’s back deck. Also sometimes called firecracker plant, the shape of the flower is clearly where this plant got its nickname. The reddish color and tubular shape of the blossoms make it especially appealing to hummingbirds, which often visit Lin’s deck. She also has a couple of hummingbird feeders, or perhaps it would be more accurate to say one and a half right now, since a mischievous raccoon clambered up to one and stole it, and she has only been able to find the top half after searching the area around her home for the other piece! In very tropical climates, cigar flower is a small shrub that grows to about two feet tall, but it cannot tolerate anything close to a New England winter. Its continuously blooming flowers through the summer make it worthwhile to grow as an annual in our climate. It will survive longer in a greenhouse, or even as a houseplant. The genus cuphea contains about 260 species, and several of them are known as cigar flower, but the Mexican species is the most commonly grown here. In addition to the hummingbirds, several butterflies are attracted to them because of their nectar. This genus belongs to the loosestrife family (Lythraceae), which includes crape myrtle (Lagerstroemia spp.), a flowering shrub commonly grown in slightly warmer climates than ours, pomegranate (Punica granatum) and the purple loosestrife (Lythrum salicaria), which is a hardy invasive plant that once had crowded out many native plants in our marshes and meadows until measures were taken to control its spread. While fuchsias (Fuchsia spp.) are often pollinated by hummingbirds in their native range of the Caribbean and in a few cases New Zealand and surrounding islands (there are over 100 species in this genus), the cigar flowers seem to appeal most to the ruby-throated hummingbirds (Archilochus colubris) in Lin’s gardens. Fuchsias are popular hanging basket plants here, where they are often grown on porches through the summer and occasionally kept as house plants in the colder parts of the year. A decorative container garden of coordinated petunias will bloom all summer. (Photo courtesy of Laura Eisener) Lin Bell’s container gardens line the retaining wall beside her driveway at left, and the Reid family’s new planting is to the right of the tree. (Photo courtesy of Laura Eisener) The hanging bell-shaped flowers have four colorful round or pointed sepals at the top or stem end and four or more rounded petals, which may be the same or a contrasting color. The petals and/or sepals may be red, pink, shades of purple, or white, and in many varieties can be the bright pinkish-purple shade we often call fuchsia! Since there is always so much to say about hydrangeas in summer, it seems a good idea to talk about lace cap styles since mopheads were highlighted in last week’s column. Lace cap-style hydrangeas have flower clusters that have both fertile flowers and infertile flowers in the cluster, usually resulting in a flattish or very slightly domed flower cluster resembling a doily. This style is found in bigleaf hydrangeas (Hydrangea macrophylla ‘Twist ‘N’ Shout’, for example), mountain hydrangeas (Hydrangea serrata ‘Tuff Stuff,’ for example) and smooth hydrangeas (Hydrangea arborescens ‘Riven Lace’ and ‘Haas Halo,’ for example). The sterile flowers have four large petals, while the fertile flowers have very small petals or none at all. The original mountain hydrangea ‘Tuff Stuff’ Hydrangea blooms in Dee LeMay’s garden. (Photo courtesy of Dee LeMay) Mexican cigar flower is a reliable bloomer that attracts hummingbirds. (Photo courtesy of Laura Eisener) ‘Tuff Stuff’ has given rise to a series that generally has similar lace cap flower forms but varying heights and other distinctive features. Like the mophead varieties, lace cap forms of mountain hydrangea and bigleaf hydrangea can be different shades of pink, blue Fuchsia is another annual known for attracting hummingbirds. (Photo courtesy of Laura Eisener) and purple depending on soil acidity, while the smooth hydrangea will always be white regardless of the soil chemistry. Dee LeMay’s ‘Tuff Stuff’ mountain hydrangea tends toward blue blossoms, as might be expected in soil produced by the granite based bedrock found in much of eastern Massachusetts. Editor’s Note: Laura Eisener is a landscape design consultant who helps homeowners with landscape design, plant selection and placement of trees and shrubs, as well as perennials. She is a member of the Saugus Garden Club and offered to write a series of articles about “what’s blooming in town” shortly after the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. She was inspired after seeing so many people taking up walking.
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