Black-eyed susan vine
* Common name: Black-eyed susan vine
Black-eyed susan vines climbing up George’s swing.
* Botanical name: Thunbergia alata
* What it is: A vining, trailing annual that produces summer-long tubular flowers of yellow, pale orange or creamy white with dark throats. Vines will twine up a support or hang down when grown in a basket.
* Size: Arms grow 6 to 8 feet long by season’s end.
* Where to use: Grow up any sunny trellis or arbor or use black-eyed susan vines to add color to light posts, down spouts and radon pipes. (Erect netting or string to help them climb.) Or let them trail down from a hanging basket.
* Care: Plant transplants or seed in mid-May after danger of frost. Unlike perennial black-eyed susan plants, these aren’t cold-hardy. Work a granular, organic fertilizer formulated for flowers into the soil at planting and scatter a booster dose of the same over the soil surface 6 weeks later. Water once or twice a week when it’s dry over summer. Yank plants when frost kills them in fall.
* Great partner: Red perennials, such as mums, daylilies and beebalm, look good at their feet. So do red annuals, including geraniums, begonias, celosia, marigolds and zinnias.