Plant Library

Other Names:  Rock Rose, x Halimiocistus wintonensis

Description:

Clusters of lovely butter-cream flowers with deep wine-red blotches cover the fuzzy-textured gray-green foliage in late spring; a great groundcover or rock garden plant; tolerant of poor, dry soils, hot garden locations and salt spray

Ornamental Features

Merrist Wood Cream Rockrose is smothered in stunning buttery yellow round flowers with creamy white overtones, yellow eyes and a dark red blotch at the ends of the branches from late spring to early summer. It has attractive grayish green evergreen foliage. The fuzzy pointy leaves are highly ornamental and remain grayish green throughout the winter.

Landscape Attributes

Merrist Wood Cream Rockrose is a dense multi-stemmed evergreen shrub with a mounded form. Its relatively fine texture sets it apart from other landscape plants with less refined foliage.

This is a relatively low maintenance shrub, and should only be pruned after flowering to avoid removing any of the current season's flowers. Deer don't particularly care for this plant and will usually leave it alone in favor of tastier treats. It has no significant negative characteristics.

Merrist Wood Cream Rockrose is recommended for the following landscape applications;

• Rock/Alpine Gardens
• Border Edging
• General Garden Use
• Groundcover
• Container Planting

Planting & Growing

Merrist Wood Cream Rockrose will grow to be about 3 feet tall at maturity, with a spread of 3 feet. It tends to fill out right to the ground and therefore doesn't necessarily require facer plants in front. It grows at a medium rate, and under ideal conditions can be expected to live for approximately 10 years.

This shrub should only be grown in full sunlight. It prefers dry to average moisture levels with very well-drained soil, and will often die in standing water. It is considered to be drought-tolerant, and thus makes an ideal choice for a low-water garden or xeriscape application. It is not particular as to soil type or pH, and is able to handle environmental salt. It is somewhat tolerant of urban pollution. This particular variety is an interspecific hybrid.

Merrist Wood Cream Rockrose makes a fine choice for the outdoor landscape, but it is also well-suited for use in outdoor pots and containers. Because of its height, it is often used as a 'thriller' in the 'spiller-thriller-filler' container combination; plant it near the center of the pot, surrounded by smaller plants and those that spill over the edges. It is even sizeable enough that it can be grown alone in a suitable container. Note that when grown in a container, it may not perform exactly as indicated on the tag - this is to be expected. Also note that when growing plants in outdoor containers and baskets, they may require more frequent waterings than they would in the yard or garden.