Penstemon Blackbird - Beardtongue

The Penstemon 'Blackbird' is an exceptional perennial, with the spectacular colour of its graceful trumpet-shaped flowers, very dark burgundy red, with a slightly white throat! It will bring grace, lightness, and sumptuous colours to your sunny flowerbeds!

The Penstemons, also known as Beardtongues, belong to the family of Scrophulariaceae (Plantaginaceae recently) and are native to Central and North America. Despite their relative lack of hardiness, they are highly floriferous perennial plants, essential in flowery gardens with a country look. Throughout the summer until late autumn, their beautifully coloured flowers bloom continuously in trumpet-shaped form, resembling those of foxgloves or snapdragons.

The Blackbird Penstemon, a semi-hardy ornamental perennial, forms a compact and upright bush, branched from the base, measuring 60 to 70 cm (24 to 28in), with a spread of about 50 cm (20in). From this tuft, upright stems with lanceolate leaves emerge, carrying long clusters of tubular flowers, widely open with unevenly lobed lips, from June to October. Extremely floriferous, it displays its splendid floral spikes, with garnet flowers slightly speckled with white above a light green evergreen foliage, revealing a superb contrast of colours. This long and abundant flowering can sometimes make the stems bend under the weight of the flowers. It is advisable to pinch the branches during growth to overcome this inconvenience. This will result in shorter, straighter floral stems with slightly delayed flowering.

Beardtongues prefer fertile, well-drained, and relatively dry soils in sunny locations. They are hardy enough to excel in flowery gardens with a wild look, where their opulent and beautifully coloured flowers will work wonders! This Penstemon Blackbird is perfect in flower beds, mixed borders, flower beds, rockeries, or pots. Its flowers will also make beautiful bouquets. Harmoniously integrating into summer flower beds or rockeries, it can be paired with perennials of various colours and plants in contrasting colours. It will blend beautifully with rudbeckias, loosestrifes, knotweeds, stonecrops, lupins, mallows, phloxes, or lady's mantles.