Baptisia Solar Flare Prairieblues™ PPAF

The flowers open in late spring and continue into summer, marking the transition of the seasons beautifully. They appear on tall, sturdy 12- to 18-inch racemes, and have a plump, pea-like shape. They will open (and change colors) from the bottom up, creating a lovely effect as the bloom season progresses. Very floriferous (a mature plant boasts more than 100 flowering stems), this Baptisia gives you enough blooms for garden and vase.

This perennial offers handsome foliage in addition to its blooms. The leaves are blue-green and very profuse on well-branched plants that look more like shrubs than perennials. They die back to the ground in winter, then reappear in spring first as bare stems shooting straight up from the ground, only gradually acquiring foliage. Baptisia is a plant that may be a bit slow to establish, growing a long taproot that makes it resistant to being moved (but also very capable of handling drought). It is exceptionally long-lived, giving you far more of a show than most other perennials. Expect it to reach about 3 to 4 feet tall and 4 to 4 1/2 feet wide, a good size for hedge, specimen, border, or even foundation. Also resistant to heat, cold, pests, and diseases, it is a fine introduction from the Chicago Botanical Gardens. Zones 4-8.