Echinacea SunSeekers Apple Green - Purple Coneflower

Echinacea SunSeekers Apple Green is a compact variety, unusual for its apple green colour and interesting for its floribundity and good performance in borders and pots. Its flowers have many short petals, which turn white as they mature, around a slightly scented large heart that attracts many pollinating insects. They succeed each other on the plant for several weeks in summer, if care is taken to remove faded flowers. It is an easily cultivated perennial that blends very easily with all the other plants in the garden or on the terrace. Ideal for cutting or drying flowers.

Echinacea SunSeekers Apple Green is a recent horticultural hybrid. This cultivar is part of the remarkable SunSeekers series, which stands out from other echinaceas for their unique shapes and colours, which do not fade over time. SunSeeker hybrids also have exceptional vigour, producing masses of flowers carried by short stems, above narrow dark green leaves. This Apple Green variety forms a dense and stocky clump of 50-60 cm (20-24in) high and 40-50 cm (16-20in) wide. The plant does not weaken or collapse, showing very good performance. The opposite lanceolate leaves are dark green and covered with rough hairs. Abundant flowering occurs from July to September, loved by butterflies. The branched stems are each topped with a solitary flower head, with a prominent, initially green, then yellow and finally brownish central disk surrounded by pleated, acid-green petals or ligules. The fruit is an achene, releasing seeds sought after by birds. This plant anchors itself firmly and deeply in the soil, thanks to its highly developed root system.

Echinacea SunSeekers Apple Green can be grown in pots or in the ground. This perennial fits well in borders, mixed with other varieties of echinaceas or inulas, compact kniphofias, achilleas, daisies, Echinops, coreopsis, etc. Lighten the scene by mixing in ornamental grasses such as Stipa tenuifolia. Splendid in borders, the beautiful colours of echinacea are also great in fresh or dried flower bouquets.

A medicinal plant: In homoeopathy, the root of echinacea is used to fight colds and strengthen the immune system. These properties were first used by Native Americans. The name Echinacea comes from the Greek echinos, which means "hairy or like a hedgehog," and acea, which means "having the shape of," referring to the appearance of the flower's heart.