Confessions of a "No Red in the Garden" Color Snob

I was a plant color snob. For years, I was anti-red when it came to flowers. Sure, I thought red was a fine color for a ripe apple, some warm mittens, or a bold pen to mark up my own writing. But I was anti-red when it came to flowers in the garden. That is, until recently…. Recently, I saw what red flowers do for visual contrast, and how they draw in hummingbirds. 

I mixed red and magenta Impatiens in my deck railing planters this year, out of desperation, really. These were the two colors available in the numbers I needed, and so I purchased and planted small starter plants in these jewel tones. The mix was a very “hot-color” mix, and set against a pale house, it looked fine. But I was quite convinced I would not love it, for I was firm in my thinking that I preferred dusty pinks, corals, unusual orange tones, and other colors in patio planters and around my yard.

Red, red, more red. Would I like it? I wasn’t sure. I used to think that red was a “typical” flower color, à la the red rose a child might draw… not unusual enough for me. Then I saw the contrast between the red and the other colors outside my windows. The red looked stunning. And then, even better, the hummingbirds came. Red is my new favorite.

For years, mixing sugar water to place in red hummingbird feeders around the garden did me no good in terms of drawing in the tiny-winged friends I hoped to glimpse. The “real deal”—the red of my Impatiens, along with some flowering Cuphea plants I had on the deck—beckoned the hummers. Fluttering from a sea of Impatiens to the unusual blooms of Bat-faced Cuphea, a hummer (or perhaps several different hummers—how would one know?) made return appearances at my windows. One hovered so long near the red Cuphea that I thought I could run for my camera and capture its beauty. No luck. But my eyes captured it. For the first time ever, I had a good, long look at a ruby-throated hummingbird. All thanks to red blooms.

I plan to take my Bat-faced Cuphea indoors when fall temperatures arrive. Cuphea can do well indoors, and I will aim to keep it thriving. I wish I could do the same with the Impatiens, but moved indoors, they would look leggy and would not do well. (I’ve tried it before. A mess!) With the red Cuphea inside my home and protected from fall weather, outdoor displays will have some red Mums, which I have just found at the greenhouse. And for next spring, even though I have never considered red to be a spring color, I have ordered bulbs for red Darwin Tulips. Red Tulips are apparently the flower of Easter in Germany, and red-dyed eggs, an important Easter sight in Greece and other Eastern Orthodox countries. My spring garden will have a spring-red display next year. Red flowers to replace or accompany the pink and orange blooms I have loved for so long. Contrast. Hummingbirds. A new lease on my life in the garden.

No one, least of all me, wants to be called “a snob”. But I do think I was a garden-color snob when I was firm in thinking that red blooms were too typical, and “not for me”. Typical… pshaw. Red Impatiens, red Ice Plants, red Echinacea, red Cuphea (both Bat-faced Cuphea and the varieties of Cuphea that bloom in tiny “cigar” form, shaped just right for hummingbird beaks)... I have a new appreciation for these and other red-flowering plants: horizons broadened, and hummingbirds welcomed in.