Gardening: A perfect fit for summer

How did the foxglove get its name? David Overend reports.

Opportunist is a word applied to quite a few plants – particularly invasive weeds. Occasionally, however, it fits  the bill with a handsome flower.

So it is that just when it seemed that it couldn’t get any better for the not-so-humble foxglove, summer 2015 comes along and gives the flower the chance to show its ability to be an opportunist.

For a plant which prefers a bit of shade, it has taken to the sun and the heat and every spare bit of soil seems to have been colonised, most often by the common purple form, although a few white and cream versions can be seen among the crowds.

Digitalis purpurea is having a field day, particularly where areas of land have been disturbed and then left fallow.

This is a plant with presence, a wild and wonderful bloomer with an ability to find a home in the smallest space, and then to shoot upwards several feet to display its magnificent flower spike.

It loves semi-shady spots, deciduous woodland areas and clearings in conifer forests, but it will happily find a home on sunny roadside verges where many local authorities have dispensed with spraying herbicides, and even in a crack in a wall.