Kitchen Garden Forum

What are the best plants for hanging baskets?, In the past I found that surfina drop and get very straggley after a short time, same goes for lobelia, upright fuchsia's get too tall. Geranium's upright and trailing also trailing fuchsia are fine but I need some filling ones for in the centre.

Bren

Dear Bren, there are quite a few, but one that i would recommend, is trailing begonias, you can get them in many different colours and sizes.

I think you might get a lot of good answers to this one Bren.

we live right on the coast(100yds to the high water line) it is always windy here I use begonias they flower well and last until the first frosts

I always reserve a few sweet peas and plant them in a hanging basket. They don't last very long there and have to be replaced with other plants in mid-summer, but to start with, they look really great, both tumbling down and scrambling up! And smell nice, of course.

surfinia.I plant about 20 plants in 8 baskets.
tomatoes.Always get a few rogue plants from my compost:-)

OH.and Gilly C thanks for the idea of Begonia's would I put them in as bulbs or can I buy them already rooted.
Bren

You can buy them ready to plant, or as plug plants to grow on you can get upright or I think it is pendulata which is what I get lovely bright coloured flowers I only put one per large hanging basket with nothing else and they easily fill the space Good luck

Dear Bren, if you do have Sufinias, if you pinch them back every so often, it keeps fresh growth coming, and stops them from going scrawly. If you just pinch a couple of the stems at a time you won't hardly notice.
Bren if you go to a nursery, you will probably find they have a secion of basket plants.

I've got mostly petunias, fuschias, bacopa, verbena, ivy and oh lobelia in mine - I stuck a lettuce seed in there too just to see what happens and a very lovely looking contrasting green shoot is coming up... tee hee!

In another basket I put the nepetia cos it's safe from the cats!!

Bought some strange looking yellow flowers last night but can't remember what they're called - need to sort them out when I get home from work.

Hanging baskets all planted up, got the Trailing Begonias,T.Fuchsias, T. ivy Geraniums, Geraniums for height, Verbenias and Petunias for filling in all at the garden centre last weekend.Thanks for all your help I hadn't thought about Begonias before, OH the baskets are for my sons couldn't relie on them pinching the tips out of the Surfinas, I still have to look after them till the end of the month.
Bren

Bren, given my allotment is 10 mins walk from home and even at this time of year it is sometimes too late for me to go there whenI get home, I've put a lot of my lettuces in my hanging baskets. Fell like a salad tonight? It's outside your back door.

mike

Mike you have given me something to ponder over, tomorrow PG.I will sort out a basket and sow some mixed lettuce leaves so that they are at hand when needed, I already have water cress or as its called here American cress growing in the greenhouse, every time I go in there I pop another stem into my mouth.
Our allotment is two bus rides away, can get there in the mornings in 40 minutes getting home is a different matter, one afternoon last week it took 1 1/2 hours traffic/road works, we could have walked it in about 1/2 hour but other half is not too well at the moment and after doing 3-4 hours work on the allotment,no go.
Bren

Bren, I'm sorry I haven't followed this post up until noe - hope you see it. I can say that my lettuces did fine in the hanging baskets and I've had several croppings from the same plants, in particular Aruba, an open-leafed red type, and Red Mustard, which is prone to die if it lacks water. No danger this year, of course.

Hope yours were successful.

mike

Bidens may be the yellow flower referred to. They are very nice in hanging baskets. Poke in some nasturtium seed for when the lobelia finish. They come through and take over just at the right time.

Mike
I followed your suggestion at the time and sowed some mixes lettuce and the basket is full now at the back door, very useful in this weather when I can't get to the plot in the rain, a lot of the lettuce heads on the plot have gone to seed or got too wet and slimy.

jane E

I bought a packet of Bidens seed 1/2 price for next spring as the individual biden plant at the garden centre are expensive. they look good in a basket light airy fairy.

Bren