The flowering of the grey-leaved form of the meadow rue marks the longest days of the year. Rising steadily and with much optimism they hit their luminous stride in the fortnight that bridges the solstice. Hopping and skipping from the narrow bed in front of the house to gather in a concentrated colony around the corrugated tin barns, we follow their sulphur-yellow trail to witness the evenings caught in their plumage.
My original plants were given to me many years ago by our friend Isabelle, who had them running freely in her front garden in the Cotswolds. They came with a warning that they are prone to seeding and that you should grow them ‘hard’ to keep them lean and from flopping. Thalictrum flavum subsp. glaucum is a distinctive selection of the species. As blue-grey in leaf as sea kale, but with a finesses and filigree that stays with them throughout adulthood. The clutch of robust seedlings which Isabelle winkled from the cracks in her pavement were initially worked into the garden in Peckham and came here in the ark of treasures that could not be left behind when we came to Hillside.
In the early days here, they were planted in the stock beds where, sure enough, they leaned and sprawled on our hearty ground. After I had gathered my thoughts and noted their reaction to good living, I moved them into full sunshine and planted them into the rubble around the barns to test the ‘treat them mean, keep them keen’ theory. The mother plants, now seedlings of the seedlings from Isabelle, were lifted with their fibrous raft of yellow roots, quartered with a sharp knife early in March and planted directly into the crushed concrete. Their naturally early start is one of the pleasures of being able to accommodate this thalictrum. The first foliage is suffused with a plum-coloured stain that only occurs in the fresh new growth of spring and is always so very welcome for its early awakening. The foliage, then proud and ahead of surrounding company, is when you know that things are finally on the move.
Their flowering growth pushes away from the basal clump in April, fast enough to overpower slower to awaken companions like the baptisia they accompany and compliment. They have never been irrigated here and grown lean and without any feeding, they need no staking and there is a joy in their shoulder high sway on the breeze. A wet day will see them lean out into pathways, but they soon bounce back. Hailing from the Caucasus and Russia, they are thoroughly hardy and long-lived as perennials, but you do have to watch their propensity to seed. The seedlings, which look unassuming, are tenacious and happy to spend their first two years in the shadow of other plants whilst they are gathering strength. Strength enough to push head and shoulders above later to rise companions that might easily be overshadowed.
Ten years on in the planting around the barn and you can begin to see the true nature of the plants and their liking of the conditions. The thalictrum’s potential to reign – for I now see their slow but sure gathering of numbers – is potentially disruptive to the stability of a planting and needs gentle intervention and careful judgement. You can prevent them from seeding by cutting the whole plant to the base after flowering. It will respond with a crop of fresh grey foliage. Or you can enjoy the seedheads and then edit in the spring when you see numbers gathering to the point of being overwhelming. I have yet to try them in grass, but young, chunky three year olds lifted in spring should be able to fend for themselves in a meadow where the conditions are dry enough for the grasses not to compete.
Whilst I have been their custodian, Isabelle moved from her place in the Cotswolds and, after several years in Berlin, has finally settled with land again in Northern Italy. I sent her seed and it felt good all these years later to have been the minder and to return the favour. An easily given gift of guaranteed light and its midsummer celebration.
Words: Dan Pearson | Photographs: Huw Morgan
Published 29 June 2024
