Ultimate Guide To Choosing Fuchsias

Fuchsias are steadfast summer plants, but not all of them are blowsy enough for baskets or can tough it out in the border. Ensure yours are fit for purpose, says Graham Rice

- Graham Rice

If you’ve ever been to the West Country – or to western Wales, Ireland or Scotland – then you’ve probably seen fuchsias seemingly growing wild. In those warmer, wetter parts of the country they pop up in hedges and by the side of the road, while they’re also being seen more and more in Greater London.

This tells us one thing – about some of them, at least: they’re hardy. Fuchsia magellanica grows wild at the southern tip of South America and it’s pretty chilly down there. For the garden, look for ‘Hawkshead’, ‘Riccartonii’, ‘Versicolor’ and ‘Sharpitor’. They’re prolific, too; but while some of these hardy types are undeniably colourful, few could be described as flamboyant.

For something bigger, brighter and more blowsy; for an all-summer dazzle of colour that will take us right through autumn (even into the winter in a conservatory) we must turn our attention to the thousands of varieties of fuchsias for tubs and baskets or window boxes. Fuchsia flowers can be divided into two: the sepals (the four parts curled back at the top of the flower) and the skirt (the four petals rolled into a tube underneath.) These two parts are sometimes similar in colour, but more often they are different – in some cases dramatically so. The skirt can also come in a flurry of extra petals, and this is what creates the double-flowered ones.

Edible berries