Baptisia australis Indigo Spires - False Indigo

The 'Indigo Spires' Baptisia is a recent variety of the Indigo Lupin, a new compact and ramified hybrid offering an exceptionally long flowering period in late spring. This plant, derived from wild species of the great American prairie, forms a beautiful densely foliated clump, with a distinct dome-like appearance. Its blue-violet pea flowers highlighted with yellow are grouped in ramified spikes, with secondary spikes extending the flowering period until mid-summer on an attractive green-blue clover-like foliage even outside the flowering season. This perennial plant takes its time to establish, but it is undemanding, highly perennial, and quite resistant to drought once well-established.

The 'Indigo Spires' Baptisia is a perennial plant of the legume family resulting from the hybridization of Baptisia australis, native to the central United States, and Baptisia bracteata, a perennial with a spreading and bushy habit and pale yellow flowers, originally from the eastern part of this continent. All Baptisias grow spontaneously in meadows and woods, most often on non-calcareous soil, among tall grasses, without much care, perfectly tolerating frost and dry summers. They can live up to 100 years.

The 'Indigo Spires' variety has a rather spreading habit in its young age, then over time forms a well-bushy clump reaching an average height of 80cm (32in), with a spread of 1m (3ft). Its growth is quite slow. Flowering begins in June, in the form of ramified spikes of papilionaceous flowers reaching about 35cm (14in). Each flower blooms from a dark violet bud, then opens up in blue-violet, with a keel (the lower petal) of yellow colour. The fruit of this Baptisia is a green pod that turns black when ripe. The foliage, which disappears in winter, is also very ornamental as it sways in the wind. It consists of leaves divided into three rounded leaflets, resembling those of alfalfa or clover. This plant develops from a particular root system, which dives very deeply into the soil to draw and transform nutrients thanks to the presence of symbiotic bacteria lodged in small nodules. Like all legumes, this Baptisia contributes to enriching the soil it inhabits.

Baptisia are close relatives of lupins, which are much better known in Europe, but they are much less demanding in terms of humidity. They share with them a preference for acidic soils. Anchored on very robust stumps, they can live for a long time in our gardens but require time to establish themselves. A true all-terrain plant, the 'Indigo Spires' false indigo can perfectly replace a small bush in a sunny flowerbed. It will find its place in a romantic garden, a dry garden, or in natural areas, for example with Linaria Peachy, sainfoin, and Indigofera gerardiana. It is also very useful for decorating a degraded terrain, which often surrounds a recently built house. It is also superb in the company of roses, Galega, Buddleias, Eremurus himalaicus, or Allium bulgaricum.

The vernacular name 'false indigo' comes from the use that some Native American peoples made of these dye plants. Indeed, they provide colouring pigments comparable to those of true indigos (from the West Indian genus Indigofera), but of lesser quality.