The first late winter / early spring after we moved into our house, I moved aside some dead leaves and found some hellebores growing and flowering. The ones you see right below Luna in the photo above. They lurked under the ground cover all winter, just ready for me to reveal them.
As the spring moved along towards summer, we found a lot of them growing up on the slope above the patio. Apparently they like it there, just just behind the rocks.
So we decided to plant more. And you know what? They like it there just behind the rocks. In fact, I tried planting one a couple of feet back behind the rocks, and it didn’t really like it as well. So last summer I dug it up and moved it. Now it’s happy.
We’ve got a similar situation in the front yard — we do live on a hillside after all. So I picked up one at Home Depot and planted it just behind the rocks in our hosta garden. And here ya go.
The two common most varieties of helleborus, Christmas rose and Lenten rose, grow nicely around here. They love shade and have interesting foliage year-round. Another thing I like is the sort of downward-facing flowers are perfect for planting up the slope, so you can see them from below.