Five Favourites, November 2025

In October I started a new ‘series’ of posts where mid-month I choose my five favourite plants of the month. Please do join in if you wish to. On looking back, did anyone notice I posted SIX last month!!! Whoops!

Well, this month there is less to choose from, although that makes it easier to pick out just five plants that really stand out while others are dying back. The first one I have picked for November is my Japanese anemone ‘Honorine Jobert’…

In August I was worried she might not flower at all, as it was so incredibly dry. I gave her some water in late August and a week or so later she was in full bloom – later than usual, but perhaps she is now making up for lost time!  Even after several frosty nights, she was still keeping her chin up until well into November and is only just starting to fade.

Another white flower making a statement in the late autumn garden is Aster ‘Ashvi’. This is the last aster to flower in my garden, from mid October until the end of November.

It looks lovely next to my silver and gold Miscanthus and a Stipa gigantea, and with some dramatic dark stems of Veronicastrum behind it.

Number three this month (I’m keeping count!) is the Salvia viridis ‘Blue Monday’ and ‘Pink Sundae’ which provide some very welcome colour so late in the year. They will drop seed and return next year.

The blue Nepeta racemosa ‘Grog’ is also still flowering in the Words & Herbs Bed, but the soft bluish green foliage is perhaps just as pretty still as the actual flowers.

And finally, Chrysanthemum ‘Anastasia’. She begins very slowly to open at the end of October, with her pink flowers complementing the last of the asters.

She is in full bloom by mid-November and will hopefully continue into December. These are wonderful flowers for cutting to bring some colour indoors, but also a lovely sight in the garden as all other colour starts fading to yellow and brown.

So that’s my five for November. I wonder if I will find five in December… What is giving you the most pleasure in your garden this month? Do share!

By the way, I will be hosting the ‘A Week of Flowers’ meme again in the first week of December. That is, posting some bright and colourful photos of flowers from my garden every day for a whole week, and inviting all my readers to join me and chase away the winter blues! Day one will be Monday 1st December 2025. More on that coming up.

Have a good weekend, and Happy Gardening!