The Bleeding Heart (Dicentra) is one of my favorite perennial garden flowers to grow. The beautiful, heart shaped flowers bloom in May and June. Plants range in height from just over a foot to nearly three feet tall (D. spectabilis is the tall variety), and they are tolerant of partial or filtered shade.Hardy to zone three, these are beautiful perennial garden flowers that can be grown almost everywhere, provided they have rich soil, good drainage and plenty of water. I believe they look best in a wildflower garden (many species are native to forest areas in the United States) or perhaps on the border area of a more formal garden space. But it's hard not to find a garden that is not suitable for these perennial garden flowers.
Propagation of bleeding hearts are done in early spring from root cuttings. You should cut each root so that there is at least one, and possibly two, eyes on the root cutting. Over the years, one plant can be divided into many, and you can establish a large bed of bleeding hearts if you are interested - so you should plan accordingly (or just give away the extra root cuttings to family and friends you are interested in perennial garden flowers).
The only real downside of bleeding hearts is their toxicity. All parts of the plants are poisonous, and they need to be kept away from children who are often drawn to their beautiful flowers. Very young children, in particular, need to be watched around the plants to make sure they don't try to eat one of the flowers, and the plant is toxic to pets as well. To read more about poisonous perennial plant species, please click here.
Or to return to the main Perennial Garden Flowers blog page and read more articles about perennial flower gardening, click here. You are also free to leave any comments have regarding this post on my blog comment page.
Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net
