Categories
Great Plants this Month Winter

Euphorbia margalidiana AGM

Louise Sims

Euphorbia margalidiana is a delightful perennial sub-shrub, very floriferous and with a long flowering period from May until November – even, as you see, into December!

This noteworthy euphorbia, received rave reviews at the Euphorbia trials at Wisley and was awarded the AGM from the Royal Horticultural Society after their three years’ scrutiny in 2015. I’m wondering why it’s not more readily available – it’s seldom seen in gardens and even less in nurseries.

In habit it is clump forming, (150cm in height and slightly less across) although if it’s too damp and well-nourished it tends to loll a little for me, and looking at the austere conditions of its native habitat, I’d say that dry is its preference. I was also worried that last winter would be a step too cold but need not have feared. It was cut to the ground by frost (-9’C), disappearing entirely, but reappeared late in the spring. So yes it’s very hardy but certainly not evergreen as some would have you believe, except in the mildest of regions.

I highly recommend Euphorbia margalidiana; it performs well, it’s robust and healthy and would not look out of place in any setting, be it a border, cottage or gravel garden – one for the future I’d say. There is no better description of this spurge than that in Don Witton’s book ‘Euphorbias’ published by the Hardy Plant Society – it should be on every gardener’s bookshelf!

NB Louise has published a beautifully produced book of her plant profiles – A Plant for Each Week of the Year. It costs £9.99 and is for sale in our online shop here.

More NB If you’re not already a subscriber and you’d like a bit more gardening chitchat from the3growbags, please type your email address here and we’ll send you a new post every Saturday morning.

By the3growbags

We're three sisters who love gardening, plants and even the science of horticulture but we're not all experts. We'd love everyone even remotely interested in their gardens to be part of our blogsite.

One reply on “Euphorbia margalidiana AGM”

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.