Herbaceous Clematis

This lovely sky blue flower is a herbaceous clematis, while never popular there is a growing interest in them as 'functional' plants, that is to say a plant to suit a particular purpose as opposed to being grown for it own beauty alone. Perhaps the most common use for 'Clematis heracleifolia' is for growing over old tree stumps, for which it is ideally suited, having a scrambling habit. Classified as a sub-shrub it was introduced from China in 1837 and has many clusters of sky blue, tubular flowers with a light fragrance from July onwards, I have used it to great effect in scrambling its way through plants that have flowered earlier in the year, it will also tolerate a reasonable amount of shade.