Better in the Garden than in Pots

April 22nd, 2014

   Lots of plants are slow starters that just don’t show well in pots at the garden center.

Japanese hydrangea vine ‘Moonlight’ — slow to get going but excellent when it gets there.

   They’re usually under-planted even though they mature into trouble-free beauties later in the season in the garden.

   Last week we looked at my top 10 plants that do the opposite… ones that look better in pots than the garden.

   Here’s my list of top 10 plants that turn out to be better in the garden than in pots:

   1.) Climbing hydrangea/Japanese hydrangea vine. These two woody vines are similar in habit and looks with their heart-shaped leaves and white or pink summer flowers.

   They’re my favorite shade vines, but it can take them a good 3 years in the ground before they hit prime. In a pot as a toddler, they’re plain and even gangly.

   2.) Leadwort (plumbago). An under-used groundcover, leadwort fills in quickly without becoming invasive, it blooms blue in late summer, and it has leaves that turn blood red in fall.

Leadwort blooming in September.

   In spring in a pot, there’s nothing going on. Leadwort is boring and puny then.

   3.) Crape myrtle. Few tall shrubs/small trees are as showy in summer to late summer as this Southern staple. (We can grow ones selected for Pennsylvania cold hardiness.)

   The problem is these are some of the last plants to leaf out in spring, much less flower. So at prime plant-shopping time in early to mid May, crape myrtles are still bare, which is why garden centers often don’t even bother carrying them until early summer.

   4.) Threadleaf bluestar (Amsonia hubrichtii). A U.S. native perennial, threadleaf bluestar is at its best when it’s had a chance to grow into a summertime 3-foot bush with ferny, thready foliage that turns golden in fall.

   It blooms baby blue in spring, but its small size in pots in spring doesn’t nearly do it justice.

   5.) Gloriosa daisy (Rudbeckia hirta). Sometimes this tender black-eyed susan relative reseeds itself for another year, but it’s under-bought in pots in May because it hasn’t yet started blooming.

Gloriosa daisy ‘Prairie Sun.’

   Once it gets going, gloriosa daisy becomes super-showy from July on. Unfortunately, few people are plant-shopping by then.

   6.) Lilies. These summer-blooming bulbs also are just getting started in May.

   The green stalks give little hint of the large, fragrant, trumpet-shaped flowers that will grace these plants in just a few more weeks.

   7.) Purple hyacinth beans. You can buy baby plants in May, but the lima-bean-sized seeds of purple hyacinth beans are cheaply and easily direct-seeded right in the garden. That means you’ll have little more than a few leaves by the end of May.

   Once the heat and sun fuel growth, the plants rocket up an arbor or trellis, producing heart-shaped, maroon-veined leaves, then lavender flowers, then shiny dark-burgundy pods that hang down from the vines. All of that keeps going until frost kills them. Definitely an eye-grabber.

   8.) Sunflowers. Here’s another annual best planted from seeds. Once up and growing in June, sunflowers produce thick stalks and gigantic flower heads that can tower 6 to 8 feet high.

   Protect the seedlings with netting to keep birds from pecking them out of the ground until the plants put on ample girth. Kids especially love these.

Red cannas blooming in summer.

   9.) Cannas. These are upright tropicals with big, wide leaves and stalks that produce clusters of lily-like orange, red, pink or yellow flowers at the top.

   Some of these can hit 6 feet tall, too. It just takes weeks to get to the point – especially since tropicals aren’t going anywhere until they’re sure frost is long gone.

   10.) Dwarf Hinoki cypress. Probably the best soft-needled landscape evergreen you can buy, many people bypass dwarf Hinoki cypress because their price-tag seems too high for their size.

   That’s because these are so slow-growing that the little 4-footer you see might have spent 8 or 10 years getting to that point in a greenhouse.

   In the landscape, they’re trouble-free, compact and won’t take over the garden in a few years unless you start chopping. Slow can be a virtue long-term.