Alpine barrenwort: green, heart-shaped leaves turn bronze in fall. Various flower colors are available.

Bleeding heart: a fernlike plant that produces drooping, heart-shaped flowers in spring.

Bugleweed: with purple and green leaves and blue or pink flowers in summer.

Coral bells: clumps of green or purple leaves topped with pink or white spires of flowers in early summer.

Cranesbill: fernlike leaves and white, pink, purple or blue flowers from early summer to early fall. All but small, compact species are recommended.

Lily-of-the-valley: a low-growing plant with fragrant, tiny white bells in late spring.

Plantain lily (hosta): glossy leaves in various shades of green or blue or variegated forms.

Spotted deadnettle: a hardy ground cover with variegated leaves and, in late spring, purple flowers.

Sweet woodruff: ground cover with tiny white flowers that bloom in late spring.

Wakerobin (trillium): three-leaved plant with white, gold or maroon flowers in spring.

White wood aster: spreading plant that produces white flowers in late summer.

Keeping your roof ice-free

A couple of Minneapolis entrepreneurs have tweaked an old home remedy to come up with a new way to melt ice dams.

John Valiton and Scott Rethwill have developed Ice Viper, a mesh tube filled with a chemical deicer that melts ice buildup on the edge of a roof. The product is modeled on the idea of filling a nylon stocking with salt and placing it on the roof, except these tubes are filled with magnesium chloride, sodium chloride and a corrosion inhibitor. Just like salt, the deicing compound is designed to prevent damage to the home's exterior and reduce concrete scaling.

Ice Viper sells for about $16 and is available at The Home Depot and some hardware stores.

- Knight Ridder News Services

Home | News | Sports | Opinion | Weekend | Churches | Classifieds | Archives Copyright 2004-Fayette Publishing, Inc.