Trampled Young Evening Primrose

[Pittymom]

Help! We just had several trees trimmed and the workers trampled our Evening Primrose bed.
It is a well established bed but the plants are young right now; still in the green floret stage, about the size of a coaster. We had 4 1/4 inches of rain earlier this week so the ground is very soft and the plants were crushed with wet boots. We've taken a plastic rake and gently raked the bed to help loosen the plant's leaves that were smashed in to the wet soil. Is there anything else that can be done to ensure the survival of this year's plants?

 

[Tetters]

Firstly, Welcome, and I sympathise - I bet you felt like punching those idiots!! So thoughtless!!
Are these plants the yellow perennial variety Oenothera 'Crown Imperial' or the yellow 'biennis' - there is another one which is white, but I can't remember the name at the moment.
If they are the perennial variety 'Crown Imperial' I think there's a really good chance that they will produce some new growth, and act as though they've just been pruned. Fingers crossed. ' Biennis ' on the other hand might not be so lucky. I think the white one grows on rhizomes, so that would also be ok. as anywhere there's a rhizome, there's a new plant waiting to pop up.
Please will you let us know if they survive? It would be good to have a happy ending.

 

[Pittymom]

Firstly, Welcome, and I sympathise - I bet you felt like punching those idiots!! So thoughtless!!
Are these plants the yellow perennial variety Oenothera 'Crown Imperial' or the yellow 'biennis' - there is another one which is white, but I can't remember the name at the moment.
If they are the perennial variety 'Crown Imperial' I think there's a really good chance that they will produce some new growth, and act as though they've just been pruned. Fingers crossed. ' Biennis ' on the other hand might not be so lucky. I think the white one grows on rhizomes, so that would also be ok. as anywhere there's a rhizome, there's a new plant waiting to pop up.
Please will you let us know if they survive? It would be good to have a happy ending.

They are yellow but I do not remember the variety as the bed is over 20 years old. We have several flower beds and hundreds of bulbs blooming right now so there wasn't a lot of room where they needed to work and I think they focused on avoiding the blooms they could see, not understanding the green near the ground would become flowers later. There was a language barrier after the site manager was called away so we are just trying our best to salvage the beds that took a beating. I will definitely update with photos as they progress. Praying for a happy ending as that is the only splash of color in that particular bed.

 

[Tetters]

If they have been in that bed for that long, they have to be perennial, so they have a fair chance of picking up - watch that space