ANNUALS are easy to grow, cheap and long-flowering, and the brightly colored forms fill the garden with cheer. The likes of cornflower, cosmos, zinnia, snapdragon and calendula are available in vibrant paintbox shades of magenta, scarlet, orange and cobalt, which brighten bare patches in borders from June into autumn.
‘The bolder, brighter colour flowers are always a joy to grow,’ say florists Caroline Harding and Kate Dalton, who grow their own flowers at the Sussex Cutting Garden. ‘The paler blooms, especially whites, get very bruised and damaged by summer rain, but the bolder colours seem to withstand a lot more inclement weather.’
Taking centre stage
At Great Dixter in East Sussex, which is famed for its use of striking colour, poppies are one of the annuals that take centre stage. The Ferrari-red ‘Ladybird’ poppy is shown off by being grown beside white sanguisorba, while the tangerine blooms of California poppy sizzle alongside pink clarkia. Also intensely orange, the Mexican sunflower (tithonia) is offset by lemon-yellow crocosmia. These maximum-colour annuals are used to fill gaps in borders between shrubs and perennials.
Another popular way to grow annuals is to mix them together to create a mini meadow. As well as producing quick height and colour in a bare, sunny patch of ground, it also provides a huge amount of nectar for wildlife.
Since many annuals are grown as cut flowers, they can also be grown in rows of colour in the vegetable patch, creating a rainbow effect. Having a cutand-come-again habit, most annuals (including cornflowers and cosmos) will bloom non-stop if regularly cut.
Drying annuals
この記事は Amateur Gardening の April 02, 2022 版に掲載されています。
7 日間の Magzter GOLD 無料トライアルを開始して、何千もの厳選されたプレミアム ストーリー、9,000 以上の雑誌や新聞にアクセスしてください。
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この記事は Amateur Gardening の April 02, 2022 版に掲載されています。
7 日間の Magzter GOLD 無料トライアルを開始して、何千もの厳選されたプレミアム ストーリー、9,000 以上の雑誌や新聞にアクセスしてください。
すでに購読者です? サインイン
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