Hanging Baskets

betty.butterfly

I'm a new gardener, and have only just started to grow some vegetables & flowers in my tiny back garden and want to plant up hanging baskets for the summer to add some colour. As I've never done this can anyone help me with what flowers I should plant and if I should do these from bulbs/seeds or buy the young plants?

angelavdavis

My favourites for summer baskets are:

For trailing down sides:
Petunias or surfinias
Lobelia
Bacopa
Bidens
Trailing fushias
Trailing geraniums

For height in centre of pot:
Fushias
Geraniums
Spider plants

You can also add herbs, strawberries and tumbling tomatoes if you want to grow food in them too

All the above I put in as small plants.

I also push some nasturtium seeds in any gaps and plant a begonia corm in the centre for later colour.

Ensure you use compost which contains moisture retaining granules. Use feed pellets designed for baskets or liquid feed regularly and don't let them dry out. Dead head the flowers daily to keep them flowering. Collect up any nasturtium seeds at the end of summer for next year.

Some people recommend putting an old plate over the liner/moss in the bottom of the basket to retain more water or line with plastic. Some baskets are available with plastic liners.

There are some handy hints on the Gardeners world side on planting up hanging baskets:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/gardening/basics/techniques/plant_hangingbasket1.shtml

david39

After doing our own hanging baskets for many years now, we've given up and go to Wilkinson's and buy theirs, ready-planted.
It's a bit too early for this year's yet, but last year we bought four for less than £5 each which was far cheaper than buying just the plants, let alone the basket, compost and chains. We just brought them home, hung them up and they lasted the whole of the summer.
You need to look around but hanging baskests can be very cheap to buy like that. Try to avoid garden centres - they are grossly over-priced in comparison and no better unless you pay big money to go up-market.

nodwah

I usually buy my plants from B&Q sad corner - all reduced to 20p etc (as long as they're not too far gone!) I find you get the best reductions on a Monday and tuesday when they're clearing last weekends stock

angelavdavis

I must admit, this year I bought plug plants of petunias and lobelia to keep costs down and have potted them on. They are now hardening off in a plastic greenhouse in the garden.


As david39 has says, I bought a lovely preplanted basket last spring for OH's house when we were selling it, it looked great and when we moved, we took it with us and it has graced our front porch ever since - it still looks great with primroses still flowering a year later!

Jake'sGran

I have two long plastic boxes of lobelia which I need to plant now. They are very easy to grow. Surfinia gives a very good show and if you take short cuttings of them they root very easily and will also keep inside a GH or potting shed over Winter. One of my favourites is Nemesia. It has a lovely smell. Trailing fuschias are lovely but don't buy the California ones as their flowers are so large they often are too heavy for the plant and drop off. An old friend grows baskets for sale and he uses fine netting over the outside of spagnum moss to keep everything tidy. Before I put the new compost in I put a circular piece of plastic in the bottom of the basket. So far I have six on the go.

olly300

If you are new and are sowing/planting a lot this year I would buy young plants.

Plants like fuchsias, busy lizzies and geraniums can be propagated from and kept over winter so you aren't wasting money.

Likewise you can probably obtain a spider plant from some where or someone.

Also if you sowing from seed you want to sow them now.

chez22

I got some hanging basket plants from aldi last year, pack of 6 plants, they were excellent. Should have them back in soon. Bought a pack of 6 from morrisons today £3.99, good variety and plants from morrisons are always good value, I always buy bedding plants from there.