Threatened Plant of the Year Competition

This February, Plant Heritage’s annual search for rare or threatened garden or house plants returns. Now in its fourth year, the Threatened Plant of the Year 2023 competition will run during spring, with the winner announced at the RHS Hampton Court Palace Garden Festival in July 2023.

Each year the horticultural conservation charity calls for anyone with a love of gardening, plants and flowers to search their own green spaces for hidden gems that could become 2023’s winner. Anyone can enter (you don’t need to be a National Plant Collection® Holder or Plant Heritage member) but all plants submitted must be a named cultivar that has been grown or sold in the UK or Ireland before 2013. Those interested have until 20th May 2023 to submit their entries, before they’re shortlisted by an expert panel from Plant Heritage. All shortlisted plants will be on display at RHS Hampton Court Palace Garden Festival (4-9th July 2023), before the overall winner is presented with an engraved Threatened Plant of the Year 2023 winner’s vase, certificate and special plant label.

To find out more and to enter, visit: www.plantheritage.org.uk/conservation/threatened-plant-of-the-year-competition-2023

Vicki Cooke, Conservation Manager at Plant Heritage explains: “Our 2022 winner was a rare peony cared for by one of our Plant Guardians Roz Cooper. Roz’s garden was the only recorded location of this type of peony, which is one of the reasons it won. Thanks to her ongoing care its future is much brighter, as she has provided plant material to someone starting a historic peony collection in Cornwall, which is helping to re-build numbers of this unique plant. Also since winning our competition Roz has had contact from others who believe they may also own one, which is just fantastic. We hope to see more interesting entries this year, which we hope can help change the fortunes of another rare plant, just like with Roz’s pretty peony.”

To find out more about Plant Heritage, how to become a Collection Holder, Plant Guardian, or member, visit www.plantheritage.org.uk

And for those who don’t have time or space to start their own collection, you can always sponsor the National Plant Collections instead!

(Below: 2022 OVERALL WINNER: Paeonia ‘Gleam of Light’. Credit Caroline Stone)