We need more friends like these

We came home from the Jersey Shore to find our neighbor, the loyal blog reader, leaving three enormous Ligularia "Little Lanterns" on our doorstep. He'd been sent by the awesome designer, who knows of our trials to turn the sunken bed from dump to shady dell, one free (or extremely cheap) plant at a time.


In a 100' by 20' area I had plenty of spaces where they could have been planted but I chose the area under the black pine where the can be seen from the dining room and den and from the tiny window in the dressing room. This spot gets a couple of hours of sunshine a day and has the loamiest soil so they should do well. The awesome designer chose the ligularia because of my ongoing frustrations with Heucheras. Every one I've planted has failed to thrive, even though they should be an obvious choice for these conditions. My long term plan is to find a Heuchera that will contrast with the Ligularia. I'm hoping the silver ones will do better than the copper-leaved varieties that I've tried before and if I can find any on sale at the nursery I'll experiment.