i agree..

i always suspected ... that they last.. because they hug the ground.. and relish the retained heat of mother earth every night ... remaining much later into the season ... by which time it is so cold.. they still remain green.. because they are by then.. in near suspended animation ...

pretty sure they are still green in spring.. after being buried under a foot or two of snow .... but once that is gone.. they desiccate pretty fast ...

ken

ps: apparently i have spent way too much time thinking about alyssum .. lol ... who knew.. lol

An interesting conjecture Ken but in any event, sometimes perennial or likely annual it doesnt really matter as it comes back w/o fail each spring.

Sweet alyssum is a favorite of mine. In the deep south, it blooms all winter long, providing a source of nectar and pollen for all kinds of pollinators. I loved keeping containers of alyssum on my sunny front porch.....they smell so good.

In warmer climates, we have to remember that they are a cool season plant (member of the Brassicaceae family), and best if planted in the fall or very early spring. Once it begins to get hot, they really begin to fail.

When I was young and a dedicated sailor, a brand new yacht was established in our harbor with the unseaman like name of Alyssum. The new boat owner turned out to be a landscape contractor with most of his clients being the mushrooming shopping centers of the silicone valley. He said it was the Alyssum that made the money he used to buy his yacht. Al

That's a neat story! I wonder if he knew that the Latin binomial for Alyssum is Lobularia maritima. Maritima refers to its native habitat in Mediterranean (and similar) maritime locations.

Not such an unseaman-like name, when you think of it!

I love Alyssum because they last a long season, really fill in a area and smell great! I am doing a experiment. On my patio are 2 large ugly rocks that look like dried blobs of lava from a volcano with lots of indentations, so I planted some seeds and am curious to see if they will grow there and cascade on down and make something ugly become pretty.

I have one alyssum left that hasn't been eaten up by flea beetles. Its a dirty word around here.