My Happy Hearts (Bleeding hearts, that is )

[SPedigrees]

Bleeding heart plants seem very finicky here about where they are placed. I have had one for years in a corner between the steps to the front porch and the side of the house and it loves that spot. It's mostly shady there, so I figured bleeding hearts would grow in other shady areas on my property, but no luck!

Yours are beautiful, Carol.

 

[Zeedman]

Bleeding Hearts thrive in the shade, so they have done well on the North side of the patio, which never sees sun, But during the patio rebuild last year, they were stomped mercilessly into the ground. You wouldn't know it though, to look at them now. You've just got to love a flower that takes abuse & neglect as if that was nothing. The 50/50 mix of pink & white was done by bees, when we bought one white-flowered plant. I'll put up lattice behind them when flowering is done.

This one volunteered at the end of our culvert - and with roots running down to the ditch, has really thrived. I planted another at the other end of the culvert to have a matched set.

 

[ninnymary]

Simply gorgeous.

Mary

 

[Rhodie Ranch]

WOW oh WOW!!!

 

[flowerbug]

i wonder if those would crowd out thistles?

 

[Carol Dee]

Thanks for bringing this thread back @Zeedman. My bleeding heart continue to do well. I have given away a few more pieces in the last few years. Although the Fernleaf and the white both disappeared in only one year! I have also lost the Red sails Hosta @Nyboy and I both bought. A casualty of the VOLE problem. I will get another when I believe the voles have been vanquished.

 

[SPedigrees]

So voles like bleeding hearts? That could be why mine died out after 3 or 4 years. They must have moved on from my tulips and crocus and gone to the bleeding hearts. Good luck vanquishing your voles. Rather than play whack-a-vole, I tend to just plant things not on their grocery list.

 

[Zeedman]

i wonder if those would crowd out thistles?

They might - in the shade, where they have the advantage & will crowd out almost anything. In the sun, mine spread for awhile; but with the exception of the one by my culvert, they seem to be short lived. The big patch I once had in the front yard was out-competed by tiger lilies, which now dominate that area.

So voles like bleeding hearts?

I doubt it. The sap is irritating, neither deer or rabbits touch it. I wonder though if bleeding heart might possibly repel moles, if planted in a border. They can really spread though, if allowed to go to seed.

 

[heirloomgal]

I wonder though if bleeding heart might possibly repel moles, if planted in a border.

Last year when we resided, we trampled our big bleeding heart bushes growing against the house (15 years old) into the ground too. I didn't think they'd come back this year either, but they did. In behind those bushes we found a little vole hidey hole where they had gotten in behind a piece of the low siding against the ground. When we pulled off the siding strip I found food they had cached in there (dried worms), so I'd be surprised if bleeding hearts repel those critters. These ones practically made a home in the bushes.

 

[Carol Dee]

N

So voles like bleeding hearts? That could be why mine died out after 3 or 4 years. They must have moved on from my tulips and crocus and gone to the bleeding hearts. Good luck vanquishing your voles. Rather than play whack-a-vole, I tend to just plant things not on their grocery list.

NO, they have not touched the bleeding hearts. It was the Hosta they took out.