Best fragrant flowers
By: Garden Gate staff
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Best fragrant flowers
Flowers with fragrance have a lot to offer! Besides being colorful and pretty, the scent they produce helps you relax after a long day at work, brings back memories of a favorite person or activity and can even draw neighbors together in appreciation of a shared plant along the property line.
Click ahead to meet three fragrant favorites!
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‘Palibin’ dwarf Korean lilac Syringa meyeri
This shrub is covered with sweetly perfumed flowers in spring that you won’t want to miss. And it doesn’t need to do a lot of work to stay in good shape, either. Just shear spent blooms to improve next year’s show if you’d like. Foliage is resistant to powdery mildew, a common problem with other lilac species.
‘Palibin’ makes a great hedge — use it along your property line so both you and your neighbor can enjoy its fragrance every spring.
Type Shrub
Blooms Lavender in spring
Light Full sun
Soil Well-drained
Size 4 to 5 ft. tall, 5 to 7 ft. wide
Cold-hardy USDA zones 3 to 8
Heat-tolerant AHS zones 8 to 1
Source Local garden centers
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‘Cranberry Isle’ flowering tobacco Nicotiana sanderae
Plant a few ‘Cranberry Isle’ flowering tobacco near your patio and you can relax after work to take in its sweet scent. Flowering tobacco is most fragrant in the evening, making it a favorite of hummingbird moths. Sit quietly and you might notice a few hovering nearby to sample those long star-shaped blooms. Seed is sold as a mix so you’ll get flowers in a variety of shades. When you’re planting the seed don’t cover them with soil — they need light to germinate. Just press them lightly into the soil to help the tiny seeds settle in.
Type Annual
Blooms Pink, lavender, mauve, white or dark purple from spring to fall
Light Full sun to part shade
Soil Moist, well-drained
Size 36 to 48 in. tall, 15 to 24 in. wide
Cold-hardy NA
Heat-tolerant AHS zones 12 to 1
Source Select Seeds
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Woodland phlox Phlox divaricata
Keep your shade garden colorful and smelling sweet in spring with woodland phlox. This native plant likes humus-rich soil with regular moisture but is also quite drought-tolerant. Plants spread by underground runners to form little colonies between other shade-loving beauties or near the front of any woodland border. When flowers have faded, cut them back to keep the garden looking neat. If powdery mildew shows up, cut the stems to just above the soil to help keep it from spreading. Plants will grow again next year without a problem.
Type Perennial
Blooms Lavender-blue flowers in spring
Light Part to full shade
Soil Well-drained, humus-rich
Size 8 to 16 in. tall, 8 to 12 in. wide
Cold-hardy USDA zones 3 to 9
Heat-tolerant AHS zones 9 to 1
Source Prairie Nursery
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