Mrs. Mold's Sun Rose
"There are as many songs about roses
As there are roses in the world."
-Grace Hazard Conkling
(1878-1958)
(1878-1958)
Mrs Mold's Sunrose (or Sun Rose) is a culivar of Helianthemum nummularium, a native of Europe. This sub-shrub loves full sun & requires little watering & tolerates poor soil, making it a first-choice for a water conserving garden, roadside sun garden, or any location difficult to get to to water, & which needs some bright color.
Bright salmon-pink blooms of 'Mrs. Mold' begin in May & persist all summer long. The flowers will be thickest in June & July. Just as it appears to be finished, it should be pruned a little, which will induce it to bloom once more in September.
There are many other cultivars in outstanding colors. Several together will form a groundcovring mat of blossoms, & protect each other from winter winds. Ours was planted alongside a White Rockrose.
'Mrs. Mold' Sunrose begins blooming one or two weeks ahead of the White Rockrose, then both bloom side-by-side all summer. The White Rockrose reputedly can get five feet tall & wide, but really not unless it can hump up against or climb something. Ours in its second year (in 2003) was not much taller than the dark salmon sunrose, which is nature when only a foot tall & a half tall. Though both the sunrose & rockrose are quite short, these two subshrubs have together spread into a complete groundcover stretching several feet wide, entirely smothering weeds in their path.Sunrose is reputedly only semi-deciduous (or semi-evergreen), but ours was fully evergreen through its first winter out by the road. It had an interesting fall display of leaf color, & was expected thereafter to drop at least a portion of its leaves, but it remained quite thickly leafed. Winter 2002/3 was especially mild, however, & sunroses can sometimes fragile to a harsh winter, to the point they could even unexpectedly die, but often reseed themselves so will reappear even so. Our winters are rarely harsh, so I'm about half expecting it to bare up to future winters as it did to the one just past.
The first photo was snapped in July 2002 when this sunrose had not been long in the ground. The second photo is from May 2003, by which time it had spread out quite excellently.