How To Plant Foxtail Lilies

Don’t think you can only plant foxtail lilies in the autumn; it can be done in the spring too.

- Annie Bullen

THE mountains of Tien Shan in central Asia form a wild and beautiful border between China and Kyrgyzstan. Climatic conditions here range from permafrost in the rocky heights to desert-like lowland slopes, where hundreds of plants and trees flourish, enduring extremes of temperature throughout the year.

Among the loveliest of these are Eremurus,.Known as foxtail lilies or ‘desert candles’, their 6ft (2m) stems, thick with starry pale pink, apricot or yellow flowers, cover swathes of the so-called Celestial Mountains’ southern slopes in the hot summers.

So here’s our spring challenge: can British gardeners grow these spectacular beauties without the backing of a mountain range and near-desert summer conditions?