Don't be a wallflower, plant them instead

Margaret Griffin

We all need a bit of colour in our gardens and lives at the moment. Here are a few of my favourite plants at the moment, but if you can't get to a garden centre, we are doing daily lunchtime videos on our Facebook page that you will enjoy and inspire you.

Wallflower 'Sugar Rush'

This is one of our favourite fragrant flowers that will stroll down memory lane with you.

Dense, fragrant flower spikes in shades of cream, yellow, red and purple appear not only in the spring, but throughout the autumn too. With a delightful sweet fragrance and compact, multi-branching habit, Wallflower ‘Sugar Rush’ is perfect for beds, borders, containers and window boxes, creating a mass of colour and scent when much of the garden is dormant. Versatile and undemanding, wallflowers are tough enough to cope in even the poorest soils. This plant will reward you with a very long flowering season.

It's a great way to brighten up your garden or front door from now, giving you colour for a long period and fragrance that will take you back to your childhood. The best compost to use is Westland John Innes multi-purpose. I would plant these with half compost and half potting grit to ensure they have good drainage.

Sugar Rush will grow to a height of 30cm. Always plant in clusters of three or five either on their own or combined with green shrubs or pansies.

So don't be a wallflower, plant them instead.

Senetti

Senetti is ideally grown in a cool and airy location outdoors. Frost protection is needed, and try to avoid that easterly wind which is scorching everything at the moment.

It can dry up very quickly, so be careful when growing in containers. Make sure you don't let your soil get too dry!

Senetti can flower through spring and summer. When the first flowering comes to an end, cut back faded flower stalks down the leaf level, give the plant a high potash feed, tomato food or slow release and you will find your senetti flowering again in a few weeks.

Campanula

Most people will recognise this plant for its ability to hug rocks and ditches to produce an abundance of flowers all summer. The wonderful Campanula ‘Mrs Rosholt’ is that beautiful blue flower that grows on walls and rockeries.

Campanula loves well-drained soil, so add lots of grit if you are planting in the ground or in pots. If planting into stones walls, just use some wet soil mixed with Westland slow-release fertiliser. Campanula can be evergreen in dry conditions, but in damper soils will lose its foliage for winter

Lithodora

This is one of the best blue flower ground covers available and is well known for its vibrant colour and good ground cover spread. This award-winning plant, which is evergreen and flowers from April to September, will brighten up any rockery or container. It thrives in full sun and but will take partial sun. Lithodora will cascade over a rock wall on down a side of a raised bed. The bees also love this!

If you have any queries about our opening hours or what's available, call 021-7334286 or email info@griffinsgardencentre.ie or why not follow our lunchtime gardening videos on our Facebook page?

 

All the team at Griffins is thinking of our wonderful friends, family and customers and wish to remind them that the power of gardening will help us get through this period.

 

Stay safe and happy gardening!