Erica carnea f. aureifolia Foxhollow - Winter Heath

Erica carnea 'Foxhollow' is a variety of heather.  It forms a compact and evergreen clump with young foliage that is bronze to golden green, which turns orange to red in winter due to the cold. Between January and May, it is covered in pale pink to mauve-violet flowers. Very bright, this plant brightens up the garden in winter with its beautiful colourful features. Like all alpine heathers, it is particularly hardy and tolerates slightly chalky soils. However, it appreciates sunny positions.

Erica carnea 'Foxhollow' belongs to the family Ericaceae. It is descended from Erica carnea, native to the mountains of southern and central Europe. It is a result of sowing Erica carnea 'Aurea', discovered at the Foxhollow nursery in England by J. F. Letts in 1969. It is an undershrub with a low, spreading habit, heavily branched, 15 cm (6in) tall and 30 to 45 cm (12 to 18in) wide. Its growth is quite slow, with a lifespan of about fifteen years. Almost throughout the winter and until spring, from January to May, it presents delicate small flowers which are pink, with prominent purple stamens. The bells are arranged in clusters 5 to 10 cm (2 to 4in) long, at the ends of the leafy stems. The melliferous flowers provide a valuable source of pollen and nectar for bees in early spring. The evergreen foliage is composed of small, narrow, erect leaves, with bronze young shoots, then green-yellow in spring, which turn orange to red in winter due to the cold.

Erica carnea 'Foxhollow' is used as groundcover, among the shrubs of a bed or in a rockery, in the company of mountain plants for example. Tolerant of pollution and sea spray, it is a heather for cities, countryside and coastal areas. A very reliable plant in the garden, it is also ornamental in a heather garden forming a mosaic of colourful and varied cushions. It can also be grown in a pot, where its lovely dense and rounded shape can adorn an angular pot.

While heathers, and in particular the genus Erica are often associated with the wet Atlantic heaths of Brittany, Ireland, or Scotland, there are also heathers that thrive in dry climates and on limestone soils, in Mediterranean regions. One of the richest areas in heather is located far away, in South Africa. In the Cape region, there is a plant formation on acidic soil, equivalent to our Mediterranean scrub vegetation, called Fynbos, which includes nearly 625 species of heather out of the 740 that exist in the world.