Nick Bailey has ideas on how boost borders with late-season flowers and colour
Give them a boost by adding colour with some late-season, long-flowering lovelies!
There’s a certain moment in late July when lots of gardens seem to lose their sparkle. The lush vibrancy of summer has long since faded and plantings can start to look a bit crispy, overblown and tired. A quick staking here, a minor cut back there and it's possible to improve things, but bringing the garden back into full fervour often calls for a range of fully grown insta-colour plants.
By slo ing in some lateseason, long-flowering lovelies now it’s possible to boost the garden’s look for the remainder of the season. Thankfully the garden centres and nurseries are open again and bursting with brightness.
I’ve been to a few over the last couple of weeks. They all seem to be doing social distancing very sensibly and have many safety systems in place. But the best news is that they’re burgeoning with big, beautiful, colour-rich plants ready to enliven your plot. Here are a few late and long-blooming species available to buy now that can easily be slo ed into border gaps.
Front of border
The front edge of beds, borders and planting schemes are often the first spot to look bare in late summer. Bring them back to life with trailing verbena, compact zinnia and sanvitalia. All of them will bloom relentlessly from now until November with minimal effort. The verbenas are available in purples, lilacs, lavenders, burgundy, blues and violet. Pollinators love them for their open blooms and successional flowers. I love them for their brilliant ability to cover the ground (about 20cm/8in high) in a sea of flowers. Compact zinnias have fewer blooms in comparison, but their bold, daisy-dahlia flowers are so richly coloured they’re sure to catch your a ention. Most reach li le more than 30cm (1ft) tall and the colour range includes virtually everything but blue. Sanvitalia are the baby of the bunch at just 10-15cm (4-6in) tall. They've a cute bun-like appearance and masses of tiny, yellow daisy flowers.
Mid-border
If you didn’t pre-grow dahlias to slot into your border late season, then worry not! Increasingly garden centres and DIY sheds are selling them grown in 2-5litre pots. These chunky, in-bloom specimens are perfect to slot straight into a tired spot, ready to bloom until the frosts. Cannas, with lush, bananalike leaves and exotic flowers, are also available as larger specimen plants and can be treated the same way as the dahlias. But for a more permanent solution to long and late colour, why not slot in a woody salvia. These hardy plants include the like of ‘Hot Lips’, ‘Amethyst Lips’ and any of the S. jamensis forms.