Bowles Periwinkle

We love Bowles Periwinkle (Vinca minor 'Bowles')! This is hands down one of our top favorite plants. But let's be honest - the top of our list is very long. We love plants, what can we say? But this one is cream of the crop! Once you see all the virtues this Vinca offers, you'll feel the same way!

For starters, this is an incredibly adaptable and hardy perennial! It’s a nearly indestructible groundcover that smothers weeds! Forming sizeable mats under a foot in height, Bowles tolerates all types of soil, all kinds of conditions, and from full sun to full shade!

Plus Periwinkle spreads like a champ! Filling those garden bare spots before you can say, “Hey! That was a bare spot!” And it just keeps spreading until you stop it.

Vinca boasts large, eye-catching pinwheel-shaped violet-blue flowers all early spring until early summer, with some sporadic blooms all summer long! Each sport a slightly pale eye in the center of the unique blooms!

The long tendrils of glossy dark-green foliage fill areas quickly with incredible weed blocking capabilities. Displaying evergreen tendencies in all but the most extreme climates, for fantastic greenery year-round!

How to Use Bowles Periwinkle In The Landscape

Once Bowles fills in, it blocks weeds, so it is a great natural mulch alternative! A showy groundcover for covering swaths of trouble areas such as that hell-strip along the road, and that hard-to-mow slope or bank.

The trailing stems root to form dense mats, fantastic rambling over the tops of hardscapes and retaining walls. Shallow roots are easily removed but quickly fill areas in deep green.

Tolerating a vast range of conditions, use Vinca around that soggy area by the gutters, or fill in that dry shade area in the corner of your property. Clambering over rocks, gravel and hillsides in both sun and shade.

Fantastic when draped out of planters and containers, you can even use these spillers in hanging planters! Rambling and cascading over garden edges and rocks, these are great edging or filling in the bare ground around mature shrubs and trees.

Use for Xericscaping and Fire-wise landscaping where this versatile and adaptable plant thrives, with virtually no maintenance on your part!

#ProPlantTips For Care

Hardy across most of America, from cold zone 4 to tropical zone 10! Tolerant of full sun in northern zones and thriving in dappled or even deep shade in the hot South!

Bowles adapts to just about any soil but needs good watering to look its best. Once established though, this tough plant handles wet soil, dry soil, drought and almost any type of well-drained soil.

Water regularly and moderately while establishing young plants, but afterward, only occasional watering is needed in times of drought for the best-looking plants.

Deer and rabbit resistant, plus fast-growing, Vinca is fantastic in troublesome areas throughout the landscape. Almost maintenance-free, just the occasional raking to clean out a build-up of litter. To stop them from spreading into an area, simply use a spade or use a lawn trimmer to keep them at bay.

We know that every garden has a spot for Bowles Periwinkle, so if you’re reading this, you should go ahead and order some from NatureHills.com right now. You’ll be adding this to your own top list of plants just like we did!