Fire Pink

Silene virginica

Fire Pink earns every word of its name. the flowers are a true, vivid, stop-sign red with five deeply notched petals arranged like a star, carried on loosely branching stems above a low rosette of sticky, lance-shaped leaves. The red is intense enough to catch your eye from across the garden, and in a shaded woodland setting it seems to generate its own light. It blooms from late spring into midsummer, precisely the window when ruby-throated hummingbirds are most active and most in need of nectar sources in the woodland understory. Available fall-planted (as noted), Fire Pink establishes best when set out in early fall and allowed to develop roots before winter. It's a rosette-forming perennial that thrives in rocky, thin, well-drained soils in dappled shade. exactly the conditions of a Virginia woodland edge. It's not a long-lived perennial in rich, moist garden conditions, but in lean, rocky soil with good drainage it persists for years and self-seeds modestly to maintain the colony. A natural companion to bleeding heart, columbine, and native ferns.