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RHS Celebrates Sir David Attenborough’s Life in Plants

The RHS is celebrating David Attenborough’s 100th birthday at this year’s RHS Chelsea by recommending ten plants that each reflect the dominant gardening theme from every decade of his life and are hero plants for wildlife

The David Attenborough Birthday Planting List will be on display at the RHS’ Bringing Nature Home exhibit designed by Dave Green in the Great Pavilion at this year’s RHS Chelsea Flower Show. The planting list has been compiled by horticultural and wildlife experts from the charity and includes:

1. Armeria caespitosa ‘Bevan’s Variety’

Armeria caespitosa ‘Bevan’s Variety’
Armeria caespitosa ‘Bevan’s Variety’ reflects the trend for rock gardens in the 1920s. These were space-saving collections that could fit into the smaller urban gardens and carried a cachet of botanical scholarliness continuing the influence of Edwardian and Victorian collectors. Armeria caespitosa ‘Bevan’s Variety’ was introduced in the early 20th century and gained RHS recognition in 1946. It is a direct link to alpine gardens of 100 years ago that is still widely grown.

2. Digitalis purpurea f. albiflora

Digitalis purpurea f. albiflora
White flowered foxglove (Digitalis purpurea f. albiflora) nods to the preference in the 1930s for a cottage garden feel. Plausible reasons include reaction to the formality and excesses of previous generations, nostalgia for ‘old England’, frugality with the great depression hardly over and boom in owner-occupied modest semi-detached homes with larger gardens.

3. Allium ‘Millenium’

Allium ‘Millenium’
Allium ‘Millenium’ reflect the government and RHS call to the public to ‘dig for victory’ in wartime 1940s to produce food and save shipping space that was in short supply. Onions for example were in very short supply as the seed producing regions were in enemy hands. Nowadays onions are cheap and plentiful but British gardeners have embraced that Chelsea garden staple, ornamental alliums.

4. Centranthus ruber

Centranthus ruber
Centranthus ruber or red valerian, a Mediterranean plant that is remarkable for its colonisation of walls and buildings. The bombed towns and cities in the 1950s were still recovering from the damage wrought by war. The many bomb sites awaiting reconstruction noted for wildflowers especially fireweed (Chamaenerion angustifolium), nicknamed ‘bombweed’ at that time. Fireweed is far too invasive, but red valerian is well behaved and welcome in gardens.

5. Erigeron karvinskianus

Erigeron karvinskianus
Erigeron karvinskianus from the daisy family, as a symbol of the desire for peace, freedom and harmony central to the 1960s counterculture. Their small size, ability to self-seed and grow in inhospitable situations and their pollinator value makes them one of the most prevalent, useful and important sustainable garden plants.

6. Achillea ‘Moonshine’

Achillea ‘Moonshine’
Achillea ‘Moonshine’ a garden relative of native common yarrow or milfoil (Achillea millefolium), an important plant for wildflower meadows that were favoured in the 1980s, with Chelsea Flower Show featuring more natural meadow type flowers.

7. Corylus avellana ‘Contorta’

Corylus avellana ‘Contorta’
Corylus avellana ‘Contorta’, the garden form of native hazel with intricate twisted stems and catkins reflecting the interest in native plants and planting in the 1990s. Hazels support over 100 insect species and are a great way to bring wild plants into medium to larger gardens, or if potted into smaller gardens.

8. Malus × robusta ‘Red Sentinel’

Malus × robusta ‘Red Sentinel’
Malus × robusta ‘Red Sentinel’ a crab apple, reflects the resurgence in fruit growing for flavour and nutrition in the 2000s including crab apple jelly. Apples, including crab apples, are known to support a huge number of insect species and many lichens and mosses on their stems. As well as planting new trees gardeners are urged to retain older apples where possible as they arerich in biodiversity.

9. Stachys byzantina

Stachys byzantina
Stachys byzantina, a water saving choice with many other environmental benefits popular in the dry gardens of the 2010s. It ticks many garden boxes; a pollinator favourite providing evergreen low-maintenance ground cover, tolerant of air pollution and supports urban cooling by transpiring water and reflecting heat and light. RHS research has demonstrated that its hairy, silvery leaves are unusually effective at trapping particulate pollutants improving urban air quality.

10. Geum rivale

Geum rivale
Native plant Geum rivale favours damp, even wet places and is valuable for sustainable drainage or SUDS plantings and flowers early giving important support to pollinators. Here it references the popularity of re-wilding, often with reintroduction of beaver in aquatic areas where this plant thrives, which has inspired gardeners in the 2020s.

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Geum rivale
water avens
  • 0.1–0.5 metres
  • 0.1–0.5 metres
<em>Geum</em> <em>rivale</em>
Armeria caespitosa 'Bevan's Variety'
juniper-leaved thrift 'Bevan's Variety'
  • Up to 10cm
  • 0–0.1 metre
<em>Armeria</em> <em>caespitosa</em> 'Bevan's Variety'
Stachys byzantina
lamb's ear
  • 0.1–0.5 metres
  • 0.5–1 metres
<em>Stachys</em> <em>byzantina</em>
Geum rivale
water avens
  • 0.1–0.5 metres
  • 0.1–0.5 metres
<em>Geum</em> <em>rivale</em>
Armeria caespitosa 'Bevan's Variety'
juniper-leaved thrift 'Bevan's Variety'
  • Up to 10cm
  • 0–0.1 metre
<em>Armeria</em> <em>caespitosa</em> 'Bevan's Variety'
Stachys byzantina
lamb's ear
  • 0.1–0.5 metres
  • 0.5–1 metres
<em>Stachys</em> <em>byzantina</em>
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