Amsonia 'Blue Ice'

[ height 12-15 in., flower dark blue in late spring, sun to part shade, clump former]

BLUE STAR, BLUE DOGBANE Needs moist soil. Cut back flower stems after bloom to induce thicker plant growth. Spear-shaped leaves grow alternately and directly from each stem. Foliage has shrublike durability and turns bright yellow in autumn. A. ‘Blue Ice’- A short Bluestar with a somewhat contested parentage.  It is thought to be a hybrid between A. tabernaemontana and A. montana, but A. montana is considered by some to be a cultivar of A. tabernaemontana.  So, is Amsonia ‘Blue Ice’ a love child of two species or a mutation of one, thus making it a cultivar and not a hybrid.  Semantics aside, it does have as much if not more garden merit than the aforementioned plants.  The flowers of A. ‘Blue Ice’ are more saturated than others in the genus being deep ice blue, and plants stay in bloom almost twice as long as other more familiar species.  Slow growing and long lived, these plants are great in mass requiring little more maintenance than a cutting back in late winter or early spring. I haven’t known ‘Blue Ice’ to form the follicular seedpods so familiar and abundant on many of the other species - perhaps it is sterile. The plot thickens.