Big cheerful ray flowers with prominently raised cones, the incredible Coneflower is a group of herbaceous flowering perennials in the Daisy family! From brilliant and bold hues, to double flowering, and dwarf to grand sizes are available for you to choose from!
Read on to learn all about these fantastic perennial gems that will make you glad you made room in your garden for a few!
All About Coneflowers
The name Echinacea is derived from the Greek word "echino" which means "sea urchin", and once you see the unique spiky domed seed pods in the fall, you’ll understand how they earned this name!
Coneflowers began as hardy native wildflowers found growing in moist to dry prairies and open wooded areas in many parts of North America. But now there are hundreds of cultivars and so many new hybrids available!
Blooming in summer and many continue right up until frost! These plants display large, colorful heads of composite flowers with bold petals that are pollinator and butterfly favorites! They sport ample amounts of pollen and nectar for many kinds of native and honeybees, butterflies, and even Hummingbirds!
Coneflowers are excellent, long-blooming plants that last and last, then rebloom if you are able to keep them deadheaded! Keeping their bold display going until autumn!
Backed by a mound of coarse, scratchy green leaves that are long, oval, and pointed, the flowers appear on strong stiff stems. The combination of their great branching and dense growth, even when not in flower, these perennials have fantastic texture!
Growing throughout a wide range of USDA growing zones between 3 to 10! Once the flowers of these herbaceous perennials go to seed in the fall, the songbirds fly in and pluck the seeds out for some fall and winter treats! The dried spiky seed heads are also fantastic additions to dried décor and winter interest.
The native forms are more than just a pretty face too! Famous for their support of our immune system, the flowers, leaves, and roots have long been used as a medicinal herb that helps fight off colds and flu! Make tea, tinctures, or dried as supplements, to prevent and shorten the duration of illness.
So Many Varieties of Coneflowers At Nature Hills Nursery!
In addition to the well-known and loved pinky-purple native Purple Coneflower, and Pale Purple Coneflower, and the bright yellow of the native Gray-Headed Coneflowers
But now, there is a world of hues, shapes, sizes, and forms for you to choose from!
The traditional pinkish-purple native hybrids and cultivars with increased blooming, better branching, and many other fantastic features include the radiant Ruby Star, and Pretty Parasol Gray Coneflowers., or Prairie Splendor™ Coneflower. There is the mighty Magnus Superior and Magnus Purple Coneflower, the dwarf Pixie Meadowbrite Coneflower that will fit into however large or small your landscape is!
- PowWow® Coneflowers
The PowWow® series of Coneflowers are brilliantly colored, well-branched perennials! From the radiant bright fuschia Wild Berry to the brilliant White, these are wonderfully easy to grow and pump out the blooms until frost.
- Artisan™ Coneflowers
The sunset hues are as pretty as an artist’s palette of the Artisan™ series of Coneflowers come in a lush range of soft warm Red Ombre, luscious Soft Orange, and deeply saturated Yellow Ombre! These cultivars beam from summer until frost!
- Sombrero® Coneflower
Big fancy hat-shaped blooms with prominent matching centers, the Sombrero® series of Coneflowers feature highly saturated petals that pop in the sun garden! Available in deep Salsa Red, Lemon Yellow, Adobe Orange, spicy Sangrita, pinkish Baja Burgundy, brilliant bold Blanco, to fiery Hot Coral. These brilliant blooms will attract all the attention to your landscape!
- Proven Winners® Coneflowers
Proven Winners® has a ton of options for you, each with vibrant hues from the Ruby Giant, to the lime-green Green Jewel, to the pink and orange Lakota™ Santa Fe Coneflower. The Double Scoop™ Cranberry Coneflower features brilliant cranberry red pompom centers,
- Proven Winners® Cone-fecions™
Featuring raised centers that look like enormous pompoms matching their colorful petals, Proven Winners® Cone-fecions™ take Coneflowers to another level! Check out Hot Papaya and Raspberry Truffle, fluffy Pink Double Delight, the pale yellow of Meringue Coneflower, and brilliant yellow Lemon Drop!
- Fun and Funky Colors!
Have fun with the vibrant PRAIRIE STARS™ Tomato Soup or the cheeky hot pink of Kismet® Raspberry and the saucy Big Sky™ Sundown Coneflowers
- PRAIRIE PILLARS™
The brilliantly orange Tiki Torch Coneflower, the dreamy Fragrant Angel, and the large saucers of the Hope Coneflower, which honors breast cancer survivors, are tall and slender perennial Coneflowers with impressive beauty all their own!
- Butterfly™ Coneflowers
Named after vibrantly hued butterflies by the same names, the radiant orange Butterfly™ Julia Coneflower or the soft sunrise mixture of the Rainbow Marcella.
- Rainbow On One Plant
Can’t decide on a color? Look no further than the Butterfly™ series, or the hot sunset hues of Cheyenne Spirit Coneflower.
For some superb autumn hues, try the hybrid orange and yellow SunSeekers Tequila Sunrise® Coneflower or the russet, orange, and ruddy Echibeckia™ Summerina™ Orange!
- Secret™ Coneflowers
The Secret™ Passion Coneflower and Secret™ Romance Coneflowers feature candy-pink pompom centers! These are confectionary delights that florists adore!
- Fancy Fantasy
You’ll even be seeing double with the Pink Fascinator will have your yard full of butterflies and Hummingbirds! Pollinators will love the huge saucers of the pale pink of the Hope Coneflower! The two-tone blooms of Green Twister Coneflower, and Green Envy Coneflower. You'll also adore the ombre bright pink and light pink curled petals of Playful Meadow Mama Coneflower!
- Moon Garden Beauties
In addition to the PowWow® White, you’ll be excited to add some Moon Garden radiance with White Swan and its bronzy cones, and the Fragrant Angel for glowing white blooms that won’t burn or brown in the sun!
- Dwarf Coneflower
The brilliantly sweet and petite Kim's Knee High™ Coneflower, along with the Pixie Meadowbrite™ Coneflower are fantastic container and planter-sized beauties!
Styling Your Landscape With Coneflowers!
All of these great varieties are must-haves for the Pollinator Garden and the Rock Garden where the native hardiness shines through! Native forms are great for rambling through the prairie, or meadow, or planted throughout the Xeric landscape! Use Coneflowers as part of your firewise landscaping defensible buffers around your home!
The fancy pompom centers of Double Coneflowers and Secret™ Coneflowers are romantic additions to the Cottage border and Cutting garden! Snip a few stems for bouquets out of this world without worrying you will deprive your pollinators of a meal! Many of these varieties are wonderfully sweet-scented, adding an extra layer of enjoyment!
Many small-scale Coneflowers are container garden-ready! Pot up Kim's Knee High™ Coneflower, along with the Pixie Meadowbrite in porch pots and containers, but really any Coneflower is a great size for planters! They love the heat and sun and will love brightening your porches patios, decks, and balconies!
Great as specimen plants and accents, Coneflowers work well when planted en masse. Use in your sun-garden borders, native plant restoration gardens, wildflower gardens, or woodland gardens. Their late-season bloom means plenty of nectar for migrating Hummingbirds and Monarch butterflies, native bees and butterflies alike!
Coneflowers provide a stunning site when mixed with Sunflowers, Coreopsis, Blanket Flower, and Black-Eyed Susan’s! Russian Sage and Salvias, Daisies, and more! The sheer variety of forms and colors means that any sun garden perennial will fit right in with this gorgeous family of flowering plants!
Caring For Coneflowers!
Coneflowers are incredibly easy to care-for herbaceous perennials!
- Coneflowers bloom best and have the strongest stems in full sun. In hotter climates, a few varieties can handle a touch of afternoon shade.
- Echinacea can grow in most any soil as long as it is well drained. Water only as needed to get your plants established!
- It is best to put a good layer of mulch on the plants in the spring to contain moisture and prevent drying out.
- Deadheading the fading blooms prolongs the flowering season until frost by bringing on new buds, not to mention plenty of flowers that are great cut flowers!
- Prune down the clumps in the late fall or early spring before new growth emerges.
- The clumps should be divided in the spring or autumn every 3-4 years to maintain their vigor.
Check out everything you need to know about Planting and Caring For Perennials in our #ProPlantTips Garden Blog!
Go Big & Bold With Coneflower At Nature Hills!
If all these perks haven’t convinced you to snap up your favorite Coneflowers by now - did we mention they are deer and rabbit-resistant, disease and insect-resistant, as well as drought and poor-soil-tolerant low-moisture usage plants?
Support pollinators and enjoy more leisure time with the long-lasting brilliance that Coneflowers bring to your landscape! Check out all the great varieties at Nature Hills today!
Happy Planting!
