With the end of summer and Labor Day upon us, I’ve been reviewing the successes and failures of my gardening year.  On the plus side, my crinum and acanthus bloomed for the very first time, and my Sky Pencil hollies didn’t die. Overall, though, it was a banner year for failures.  The mystery is why.  

I owe my hibiscus an apology.  Not my hibiscus syriacus, the nearly indestructible Rose of Sharon that is still churning out flowers daily, but my perennial hibiscus “Crown Jewels,” which seems to have been eaten alive while my back was turned. 

Perennial hibiscus, sometimes called rose mallow, is a native plant that is all the rage these days.  The most popular varieties have dinner-plate-size blooms in shades of red, hot pink, and white, but these are not my favorites. To me, they look fake, almost freakish, the accidental outcome of a bolt of lightning and an ill-timed electrical current.  “Crown Jewels” is more demure.  It has pretty dark foliage and blooms that measure a paltry 6 inches across - large enough to make a statement but not garish.  The flowers (which, like all hibiscus, last for only a day but appear throughout the summer) are white with a red center, and make a nice contrast with the blue Rose of Sharon and bog sage nearby.  

Best of all, “Crown Jewels” likes its days hot and its soil soggy.  As such, it seemed the perfect plant to help transform my swampy back yard into something resembling a garden.  I had no intention of tromping about in the mud coddling sensitive plants that probably wouldn’t survive anyway, so I made sure to select only tough plants that were suited to the conditions.  Let nature take its course, I said.  And that’s exactly what it did.