I always get suckered in by Veronica spicata plants. There are many cultivars to choose from with lovely blue, purple, pink or white spikes. They sit all innocent in their pots at the garden centers with bees buzzing happily around their blossoms, and I can’t resist them. Once I plant them in my garden, however, all bets are off. I’ve tried at least a half-dozen cultivars over the years, and they always succumb to some disease and I have to yank them out.
This spring I was unwittingly lured in by a pretty new cultivar called ‘Fairytale Pink.’ I was so smitten that I bought TWO plants. I planted one in full sun and the other in partial shade. For the first few weeks they looked great with beautiful light pink spires atop healthy green foliage. But soon both plants started getting splindly and flopping all over the place. I cut one back and propped up the other one with linking stakes to see if either method made a difference. The plant I cut back sent up new growth but eventually flopped again, even on shorter stems. It only sent up one or two blooms for the remainder of the summer.
The plant I had staked up, proceeded to develop powdery mildew and lost all of its leaves. Then it quit flowering and left me with some sickly-looking, naked stems. I still wasn’t ready to give up. I cleaned up all the diseased leaves from around the plant, trimmed it back a little and hoped for the best. It never recovered and in mid-September I surrendered and dug it out.
I wanted to love ‘Fairytale’, but it did not have a happy ending.