Whether it’s drifts of golden daffodils or a multi-coloured kaleidoscope of tulips, spring bulbs are the perfect choice to fill borders, patio pots and window boxes. Many fill the air with their heady fragrance too, like hyacinth, making them an ideal pot plant to grow indoors.
Keep the colour coming by mixing bulbs with seasonal bedding plants including long-flowering wallflowers, frothy forget-me-nots, bold daisy-like Bellis perennis, pansies and dainty violas, or primulas and primroses. Also choose early flowering hardy perennials like brunnera, epimedium, bergenia, hellebores, euphorbia, and a host of others.
For many, camellias are the plant of choice for classy spring colour, and although they require an acid soil to flourish they can be planted into large pots of ericaceous compost instead.
PLANT SUGGESTIONS:
Any plants providing Spring Colour e.g.
* Spring flowering bulbs
* Spring bedding plants, including Senetti
* Hardy Perennials such as Perennial Wallflower (Erysimum ‘Bowles’s Mauve’), Hellebores, Euphorbia, Bergenia and Bruunera ‘Jack Frost’
* Green perennials to plant now such as Paeonia, Lupin, Delphinium, Hollyhock (Alcea), Digitalis.
Spring flowering shrubs:
* Erica x darleyensis eg ‘Ghost Hills’
* Oregon Grape – Mahonia aquifolium ‘Apollo’
* Pieris japonica eg ‘Passion’, ‘Flaming Silver’
* Skimmia japonica ‘Rubella’
* Camellia, Azaleas, Rhododendrons
Source: HTA www.hta.org.uk
