Colocasia gaoligongensis

The Southeast Asian taros (Colocasia species) are very popular right now for subtropical plantings, with their huge tropical looking aroid leaves - often dark and beautifully textured. In this case the leaves are up to about 2ft across, a soft matt green and heavily marked black toward the centre. Yellow arum flowers appear in summer.

Like many subtropicals (Canna, Dahlia etc), some of them are surviving the winters outdoors in the UK these days but very few are reliably hardy. This is where gaoligongensis comes in. Under good conditions (damp and warm in the summer) it's a vigorous big exotic herbaceous perennial. It will grow in drier conditions but the leaves will be smaller. It also does well in my shallow pond.

Here at least, it seems remarkably easy - running around on stolons and potentially filling a large area. Grow it with other big vigorous perennials - nothing too small and delicate, in sun or part shade.

Plants are lifted from the ground for despatch
£15