Echinacea Tennessee Coneflower

Standing straight and true, this floriferous easy grow plant is quick to grow and establish offering mid height colour for many months. Out of interest it always blooms facing Eastward so plant with this in mind.

The flowers of Echinacea tenesseensis flex forward instead of backwards like most Echinacea. They open from late spring and the cones can endure into winter where they age to black.

Echinacea keeps on giving, with months of flowers as well as viable seed for sowing. The narrow, mauve to pink petals radiate around the mounding, chocolate to bronze cone.

Echinacea flowers are excellent for cutting as they last well in a vase, and can be dried. While the flower season is already quite impressive, cutting blooms and/or deadheading will help to promote more flowers and extend the bloom season (Jan – Mar). Alternatively you can cut it back to half after the first bloom, add some fertiliser and enjoy a second, shorter season into autumn.

You can even choose to allow the flower heads of Echinacea tenesseensis to stay on through winter, as the seed pods will remain decorative right to the end. The hairy leaves grow towards the base of the plant.

Echinacea grows best in full sun. They prosper in a well drained soil that is moderately fertile to humus rich. Water to establish, then only if rainfall is low. Echinacea plants become dry tolerant as they establish.

Echinacea plants are popularly known as Coneflowers. They are native to Eastern and Central North America. Echinacea tenesseensis is commonly known as Tennessee Purple Coneflower.