DON’T PUT YOUR BEDDING TO BED!
Your petunias may be fading, but that’s no excuse to leave the garden colourless till next spring
AUTUMN’S mild start may have extended the lifespan of summer hanging baskets and bedding, but it won’t be long until the tired plants need binning. Yet there’s no need to leave your soil bare – or consign the baskets to the shed. Just put in some fresh seasonal plants and you’ll brighten up your garden for months to come.
On a recent trip to a local garden centre, I found the outdoor plant area heaving with suitable specimens. Apart from a great range of autumn- and winter-flowering bedding plants, there were shrubs, grasses and conifers in pint-sized pots, along with several different trailing plants.
Primroses, polyanthus and violas were among the winter-flowering bedding stalwarts, while forget-menots, large-flowered bedding daisies (Bellis perennis), scented stocks, wallflowers and Sweet Williams were available for planting now, ready to bloom from spring on.
Most space in my garden centre was given over to pansies, which will impress from autumn into spring. These low-growing beauties come in shades of white, yellow, orange, red, blue, violet, pink, purple and near black. Some have multicoloured flowers or are attractively blotched with dark patches.
Cyclamen persicum are another popular choice for their silvery marbled leaves and large flowers in shades of white, pink and red. Sometimes described as florist’s cyclamen, because they were traditionally offered for sale in flower shops in the run-up to Christmas, they’ll churn out blooms well into the New Year.
Native to the lands of ancient Asia Minor, these plants will tolerate temperatures down to about -4C, so are usually treated as annuals. I’m fortunate to live in a place where frosts are rare – a group of Cyclamen persicum have flourished for many years in my sunny, sheltered front garden.
Variegated euonymus, choisya, box, rosemary and hebe are perfect shrubs for adding structure and evergreen colour to a basket. Heathers, Skimmia japonica ‘Rubella’ and Gaultheria procumbens also boast showy flowers, bright buds or berries to help cheer up displays.
Steer clear of the A-Z shrub section in your garden centre, where these plants will be offered in 6.5in to 7.5in pots. There won’t be space left for anything else if you plant one, so look out for well-rooted cuttings or young plants grown in much smaller pots. Most garden centres sell shrubs for baskets in pots of 5in or less.
A few foliage plants are essential for adding texture and colour and filling in gaps. Try diminutive upright conifers, ferns, heucheras and grasses, such as Carex comans ‘Frosted Curls’ and Festuca glauca. The silvery grey leaves of Senecio cineraria ‘Silver Dust’ make an excellent backdrop for flowers.
Sadly, there aren’t that many trailing plants that can cope with winter weather. Your choice is going to be largely restricted to ivies (variegated ones are the showiest), creeping thymes and variegated periwinkles, such as Vinca major ‘Illumination’. Another option is to plant trailing pansies or violas.
Prepare baskets for replanting by throwing away the current plants and compost – both can be tipped on to compost heaps.
If you’re starting from scratch, you’ll need a basket. Loads of different types are available, and the choice is largely down to taste. The only thing to bear in mind is that the larger the basket, the more impact it will have. For my money, it’s not worth bothering with anything less than a 35in container.
Many people use straight multipurpose compost in hanging baskets, but I think a mixture of multipurpose and John Innes No2 (about 50 per cent of each) provides better results in winter baskets. Any shrubs will love the addition of soil-based compost and the extra grit prevents the compost getting too soggy.
THE secret to making a good basket arrangement is to use a mixture of plants with different shapes and growth habits. Upright varieties are perfect as a centrepiece, while mound-forming types provide interest below. Trailers should be sited around the edge or planted in preformed holes around the outside.
Either come up with your own planting combination or go for a tried-and-tested basket recipe. Skimmias look good as the focal point in a display with heathers, cyclamen and variegated ivy, while the structural form of a dwarf conifer can be softened with wispy grasses, pansies, berry-bearing gaultheria and trailing vinca.
There aren’t any hard and fast rules about combining colours, but I’ve always thought a few shades that work well together in harmony is a safer bet than overdoing it, using lots of different colours that could end up clashing horribly. Even a basket containing flowers of just one colour looks stylish.
Whatever you decide to put together, always buy a few more plants than you think you need. Plants will not put on as much growth as those in summer, so it’s best to pack them in fairly tightly to ensure instant impact.