Echinacea purpurea Prima Ginger - Purple Coneflower

Echinacea Prima Ginger is a variety of Purple Coneflower from the latest generation that combines a compact habit with excellent floribundity, right from the first year of cultivation. The plant forms a small bushy clump that produces a profusion of flowers in various shades of orange, for many weeks in summer. Generous and beautifully coloured, this perennial plant adds a lovely touch of colour to the garden, as well as the balcony or terrace. It grows easily in the sun in ordinary soil. 

Echinacea Prima Ginger is part of a series of selected cultivars in the USA by Terra Nova Nurseries for their compact habit and floribundity. Its ancestor, Echinacea purpurea, is a perennial with a strong character, native to the western United States, from Georgia to Michigan, passing through Oklahoma and Ohio. In its natural habitat, the plant colonizes rocky meadows, savannas, open woodlands, and roadside edges.

Echinaceaa Prima Ginger quickly forms a dense clump of well-branched leafy stems, reaching 40cm (16in) in height and 35cm (14in) in width. This plant does not weaken or collapse, showing excellent stability. The leaves are opposite on the stems, lanceolate in shape and green in colour, covered in rough hairs. The flowering begins in June-July and continues until September-October, attracting many butterflies. The stems, reddish-brown in colour, are topped with a solitary inflorescence in a 6-8cm (2-3in) diameter head, with a prominent, rough, rust-coloured disk turning brown, surrounded by ligules resembling petals. Their colour changes from soft orange to salmon and then peach, with a pale red halo around the central cone. The fruit is an achene that releases seeds which birds love. This plant firmly and deeply anchors itself in the soil, thanks to its well-developed root system.

The Purple Echinacea Prima Ginger offers abundant flowering in gently spicy shades that will work wonders in pots or as a border plant, mixed with other compact coneflowers or alongside yarrow, marigolds, globe thistles, perennial salvias... Lighten up the scene by mixing in some ornamental grasses like Stipa tenuifolia, Muhlenbergia capillaris... Splendid in flower beds, the beautiful colours of the Purple Echinacea Prima Ginger are also stunning in fresh or dried flower arrangements. 

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