There are nine species of these wildly exuberant flowers, botanically known as 'Echinacea' belonging to the 'Asteraceae' family of plants and all of them are rhizomatous. This means that they develop nice, fattish and rather longish root systems in which they store lots of wonderful growing energy from season to season.

Indigenous to America and Canada, where they decorate mile upon mile of natural prairie as well as gardens and parks, they are also commercially grown in many countries of the world for use in herbal medicines, lotions, potions, shampoos, soaps and a whole host of other interesting things. They are also a reasonably popular cut flower and the dried heads, correctly known as 'cones' are extremely popular indeed with those interested in dry flower arrangements.

Now, a little bit more about these mesmerising plants themselves most varieties reach a height of three to four feet, although there are a couple of smaller ones, and all of them tend to bush out and smother themselves in blooms up to an incredible six inches across which is an awful lot of flower. The average rule is that the petals begin life holding themselves straight up before, after some time, deciding to politely curtsey and go into reflex mode; however, there are exceptions and earlier this year I enjoyed an astonishingly fascinating time watching 'Echinacea pallida' spring into action.

Unlike other coneflowers whose central cone pushes upwards as the flower petals bend down, 'E. pallida' begins life as a very elongated, pale green cone and one wonders, or at least I did at first, what on earth happened to the dazzling yellow petals it was supposed to have? The cones slowly, over a period of about a month, grew longer and thinner — all cone and no flower. I was just about ready to give up on them when, lo and behold, they suddenly started sprouting little green frills around the base of each cone.

Then, just when I had got used to the fact that they were very disappointing green coneflowers they changed their minds and the green petals unfurled to reveal brilliant gold tones. At the same time, the central cone around which they were performing an exuberant ballet, slowly but surely transformed into a chocolate brown finger and I was definitely hooked.

Massed with glorious flowers above somewhat filigree foliage, they launched their symphony in early spring and, this being early autumn, are going absolutely dizzy with encores and producing millions of seeds in the process.

The other species I grow is 'E. purpurea' which, despite its name, isn't purple at all but, quite definitely, deep pink fading to pale pink. In time it exhibited a pollen dusted, green turning to brown, fat, rounded cone from which, once it is totally dry, I will extract countless seeds to increase my stocks. 'E. purpurea' is very different from 'E. pallida' and, if one didn't know, they could be taken for completely unrelated plants. 'E. purpurea' has large, almost oval, deeply veined, glossy green leaves, its flowers are huge and even the petal shape is different.

What they, along with other members of this striking family, have in common is that they enjoy sunshine, thrive in well drained, preferably sandy soil, are reasonably drought tolerant once established and, providing it is fresh, germinate rapidly from seed. Fresh seed, sown the very day it was harvested, germinated in exactly five days which, I think, is pretty good going.

Seed should be sown during early autumn in the plains and is best sown in pots not trays as the roots need a decent depth of soil in order to develop strongly. Seedlings should be planted out where they are to flower or one plant per ten-inch pot, once they have passed the four leaf stage. They should flower, profusely, in the following spring and, once established, hate to have their roots disturbed.

The colour range among the different species and hybrids now available includes brilliant white, sunshine yellow, purple, red, and rose. Also, double flowers have been developed to complement the more usual single ones.

An increasingly popular medicinal herb, this family of plants is an easily grown, magnetic plant for anyone's garden and I encourage you to give them a try.

Caution Do not attempt to prepare your own herbal remedies. Please leave this to an expert. All herbs can be harmful to health if not utilised in the proper manner and dosage.

Please continue sending your gardening queries to zahrahnasir@hotmail.com. Remember to include your location. Answers to selected questions will appear in a future issue of the magazine. This takes time. The writer will not respond directly by e-mail. E-mails with attachments will not be opened.

Please note The writer's garden is not open to public.