Plant Profiles
Avid Gardener members: Got a plant that looks great this season? Send us a brief description. What's terrific about it? Does it have any negatives? What kind of care makes it shine? Email to Mary-Kate Mackey
Avid Gardeners - Plant Profiles
Sarcococca (Sweet Box) by Mary-Kate Mackey
The scent of Hawaii in January - that's the reason to grow sarcococca. Tiny white flowers open along arching stems of this shiny-leafed evergreen shrub and waft their jasmine-like fragrance into the surrounding garden. On the darkest days of our Northwest winters, I always find an excuse to weed the beds on the north side of our house so I can breathe in the improbable drifts of tropical deliciousness, even as rain pelts down my neck. In nurseries, look for either Sarcococca rusicifolia (with red berries) or S. confusa (with black berries). Both grow four to six feet - although mine in fourteen years seems to arch over at around four feet, and likes to lean on the house walls if I let it. It could be easily propped against a trellis for an informal espalier. Plant in good garden soil, in full shade to partial sun. Several encyclopedias mention that it can also grow in full sun with more water. Once established, mine has thrived on little supplemental water, which makes sarcoccoca an excellent choice to plant in dry shade or near the house foundation - perhaps by your front entry, where its winter scent will welcome family and friends. Clip branches for indoor enjoyment.
I also grow S. humilis, a sixteen-inch tall evergreen groundcover that slowly but inexorably enlarges itself. Mine has quadrupled its space in fourteen years, swallowing up hapless primroses and pulmonarias. Give this one poor soil to control it, or confine the size by edge-pruning the plants once a year. The heavily-rooted mats are hard to remove once established. On mine, the flowers are not as strongly scented, but do add to the general January fragrance.
Positives: Strongly fragrant blooms in winter, evergreen foliage, low water requirements, grows in shade.
Negatives: Can sucker where branch tips meet the ground; some people hate the flowers' scent; S. humilis is quietly aggressive.
Helleborus X hybridus by Ernie and Marietta O'Byrne
Helleborus X hybridus - the plant that has it all! Belonging to the buttercup family (Ranunculaceae), it is an elegant, colorful, evergreen perennial, blooming in winter and early spring, growing to 18 inches tall and wide. Just at the time of year when the Pacific Northwest is at its grayest, in January and February, buds of this flower push up from the soil and burst into bloom. With a recent surge of breeders and hybridizers working hard, flowers have taken on an amazing range of colors from pure black to reds, pinks, yellows, picotees and snowy whites and anything in between. An 
older plant can have more than 500 flowers, opening over three months. Attractive, dark green leaves are palmately cut into 5-8 segments and are totally deerproof. They prefer a woodland setting but are quite sun tolerant (in the Northwest anyway). We enjoy the flowers through April, most often planted in the company of ferns and spring bulbs.