BRIGHT SPARKS
Summer is gone and our days grow shorter and colder. But this is not the time to abandon your garden. October can be a beautiful month with some of our prettiest plants at their best. Leaves will fall, but their colours grow warm before they go.
Spring blossom flies away in a puff of wind. Shakespeare tells us ‘summer’s lease hath all too short a date’. But autumn is a slowburn season when late flowers look beautiful for weeks.
Wander through a well-planned autumn garden and you’ll find a wealth of interest. Dahlias, salvias and the vast tribe of daisies provide swathes of colour.
Special plants will feature, too. Late gladioli and nerines bring spring-like freshness to a sunny spot. For part- shade, I’ve just planted roscoea red Gurkha.
Individual flowers last much longer in autumn. A summer rose fades in 48 hours. But perennial asters and late chrysanthemums stay fresh for weeks on end. They’re great for cutting, too. Autumn flower colours are bright, but seldom garish. Gentle pinks, warm apricot, mellow orange, and soft violet-blues abound. These are even more beautiful against a backdrop of shrubs or trees turning gold. OcTOBer is an excellent month for planting anything hardy. Bare-root plants will settle as quickly as those in containers. But when buying, choose plants with good root development.
even the tiniest garden benefits from a few late bloomers. Dahlias are among the best and as happy in roomy containers as in the ground. If you keep deadheading, they’ll flower until the first brutal frost.
michaelmas daisies are stars of an autumn border. Their blues, mauves and pinks work beautifully together. Some are prone to mildew so choose varieties with known resistance, including Aster novi-angliae.
Smaller-flowered asters include the enchanting Little carlow, whose violet-blue rays surround lemon central discs. I grow this near November-flowering, twotone pink A. lateriflorus. Tender plants can be fabulous in autumn. Non-hardy penstemons such as Sweet cherry or mauve Alice Hindley flower until November. my frost- tender purple Salvia Amistad, scarlet S. royal bumble and blue S. patens have weeks to go.
If you have room for shrubs, make space for a late performer. I’ve just planted silver-leaved, blue- flowered Caryopteris x
clandonensis Dark Knight.
HARDY IS BEST PICK A TALKING POINT
FOR a big border, Lespedeza thunbergii is a woody perennial with two-metre stems. From mid- September these are smothered with rose-magenta pea flowers. every garden benefits from a conversation piece. mine is a spindle tree Euonymus alata whose autumn leaves glow like hot coals. For milder areas, Desfontainia spinosa has more class. The evergreen leaves look like holly. But throughout autumn, the shrub carries red flowers which hang like little lanterns.