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Container Gardening

low maintenance container flower plants?

16 years ago

Hello,

I would like to have some low maintenance perennial flower plants that are doing well in containers and are readily available in most of garden center. Would you name some, please? Thanks

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Comments (10)

paulallen
16 years ago
In the NYC area, heuchera does well in 14-inch diameter containers in partial shade, (about two hours of sun). The same holds for hakone, (foliage), Japanese fern, (foliage). In partial sun, the following do well in 20-inch diameter containers: coreopsis Moonbeam, rudbeckia Goldsturn, platycodon. My soil mix is compost/manure with healthy amounts of perlite for drainage and two + inches of pine bark or cedar mulch - varies. Good luck. I hope this will work in GA.
chueh
Original Author
16 years ago
Thank you so very much. Your answer is very helpful. Another question, though. Are there early spring or fall flower plants doing well in containers?
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Pam - along the side of the house there is a 5-8 foot wide flat walkway of old bark, and next to it, covering the slope are some junipers that have been well-trimmed through the years. Since they are doing their job of erosion control, and I really don't have to look at or maintain them short of an annual trim, I will leave the ones along the side of the house (and throw in a couple arborvitae or similar to screen off the dead wood on the end) but as soon as we get into the actual yard, the bushy scary eating the yard ones will come out. Thanks for your input karinl. I am becoming more keen on including conifers in the landscape. That has been something that I'm getting more and more used to. When I first moved it, I was so against anything non-broadleaf evergreen it was ridiculous. We were going to go with an alaskan weeping cedar (and still may) but at Flower World, we ran into something called a dwarf sequoia, which was SO interesting, and we will almost certainly be using it in the landscape. I've been unable to find anything online about them. It had a similar growth pattern in that it kind of looked Dr. Seuss-y, the branches hung almost straight down, but it was gorgeous. We have 5 HUGE fir trees, one on each corner of our yard, and they ALL belong to neighbors. The people across the street from us are hoping to open up their view a bit and have spoken about wanting to go in on taking down the one uphill of us, but the people that just bought that house are like the Seattle suburb wannabes of Jersey Shore so I do not expect that they will have any interest in spending any money on landscaping. I caught them thinning out a photinia that provided privacy screening between our back yards with a sawzall (.25" thick branches). The people downhill from us are renters and based on the state of various "wear items" around their house, like the fence, I have a feeling the landlord is uninterested in investing any money in the property that they don't have to. Cliffs: It's unlikely either of those huge fir trees are going anywhere. Thanks for the kind words on the back yard. I've spend the last 2.5 years trying to whip it into shape. We have put a huge deck between the 2 decks on either side, the raised veggie beds, defined garden beds around the decks and elsewhere have gone in, I've taken out about 1/2 of the lawn, we put in a fire pit and gravel "patio" in front of the other deck to address the ongoing lawn moss and crappiness issues, and torn out about 1000 sq feet of vinca minor and 3 overgrown rhododendrons. It has been quite a project, and I feel that I've gotten far enough with it that I'm ready to start tackling the front so it doesn't look like meth addicts live here. I'm not particularly tied to nandinas, and after spending $50 today on ONE dwarf variety for vignette #1, I have been seriously rethinking my position. I have a couple more plants to move from the back yard to the front tomorrow morning, but I will post photos tomorrow once I get everything "completed." It looks FANTASTIC.
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Have you considered planting a few trees to help shade the house? I have three on the east side of my house to keep the sun off of the roof until about 11am. I wish I could plant some on the other side, but the fenceline is too close. How much room do you have around the deck? How wide can the shrubs get? I wouldn't worry at all about bees. Bees that are collecting nectar are single-minded and rarely take time to sting unless you grab them. Most shrubs don't bloom for more that a few weeks a year- so it's not a huge issue. The classic hard-to-kill shrub is the wax-leaf privet. It gets flowers for a short period of time in the spring, but most people prune them so they never flower. One of mine is very old and is now a small tree about twelve feet tall. I have others that screen off the neighbors. They are deep green, drought tolerant, insect and disease resistant, and can take the heat. Another nice shrub is rhaphiolepis or Indian Hawthorne. They flower in different colors of pink or white. They get wide rather than tall, although you can buy them as small trees. Renee
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Your yard looks great! I realize its been a year but I would love to see current pictures:) I am facing a very similar situation and was wondering what you ended up planting on the berm? Also curious to know if you had the rest of the juniper removed? We have a large one in our yard that has kind of taken over and are thinking about having it taken out and replaced with something more manageable as far as size and trimming needs, but hopefully as drought resistant since it is a difficult area to water.
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I second the recommendation for the Rozanne cranesbill and coreopsis. Coreopsis come in different flower forms, all long blooming. I have had the best luck with a yellow threadleaf coreopsis called Zagreb. It's supposed to be extra hardy. I have also had bad luck overwintering Gaillardia. I had five Arizona Red Shade plants last year, and all of them died over the past winter. I also second the recommendation about the reblooming daylilies such as Stella D'Oro (golden yellow). They are very long blooming, and they should be fairly easy to find and probably cheaper than some of the fancier daylilies. There are other "Stella" varieties in other colours, too: I have purple and red Stellas. Up here, I see Stella D'Oro daylilies planted in places like shopping mall parking lot medians. That says something about how low-maintenance and useful these plants are. I doubt they get a lot of TLC in places like that, and they probably provide colour more cheaply than annuals that must be replaced every year. Some salvias are relatively long blooming, especially if you cut off the old blooms. Blue Hills salvia and East Friesland salvia have been good for me, but there are probably others that also bloom well. Salvia are pretty tough.
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paulallen
16 years ago
I don't have any Fall plants. I also used some asiatic lily bulbs (lollipop, other?),in containers and they do well.
marquest
16 years ago
I have sedum in pots for fall color. These flower and have colorful leaves.

Sedum October Daphne
Sedum Tri-color
Sedum Frosty Morn
Sedum Autumn Joy
Sedum Neon
chueh
Original Author
16 years ago
Thank you all. I got good helps from you.
lynnencfan
16 years ago
Living in Georgia - you can't go wrong with any of the lantanas - I have them in several mixed containers and the lantanas will overwinter for me so they should for you also. They will bloom for you right up until frost and are a butterfly magnet and take very little care, can take drought and don't need a whole lot of fertilizer. Good all around low maintenance southern plant and readily available......

Lynne
chueh
Original Author
16 years ago
It looks cute, but I have not seen it in any garden center. Perhaps I did not pay attention. Thanks
OUTofSPITE
16 years ago
I don't know what zone you're in but this is what I have as far as low maintenance-
Black Eyed Susans - they started blooming at the beginning of July & have been going non-stop since.
{{gwi:25415}}

Day Lilies - certain types bloom from June thru fall.
The ones I have, Stella D'oro fall in that category.
Mine started blooming at the beginning of June.
Here they are on June 10th when the 1st blooms opened. Note all the buds.
{{gwi:47240}}

On June 27th-
{{gwi:47241}}

They pretty much bloomed like this until the end of July. After about two weeks of nothing, they started bloming again. I haven't taken another shot of them yet, but there were 10 flowers on them yesterday - and lots of buds.
chueh
Original Author
16 years ago
Outofspite, how do you grow your Stella D'ora so well in containers??? I have two in a container. The leaves are tiny, and the blooming time was only 3 days. I asked an expert. He said that Stella D'ora need to be planted in the ground to have good growth, because they need to strech. Thats' why I started up this thread, because everything I planted in the containers does not seem growing well, even the lily, the easiest grown type of plant............ I am little frustrated....
OUTofSPITE
16 years ago
I don't do anything special.
I inherited these when I bought my townhouse 10 years ago.
They were in one pot. I divided them in quarters after 2 years - gave Mom one of the sections. So that left me with three. I should have divided them last Spring - but didn't get around to it. This year, I noticed one of the pots was starting to crack so I KNEW I had to split them up.
I have the ones in the cracked pot to my uncle - who planted them in the ground in his yard.
The other 2 I split in half, So now I have 4 pots.
New math... 3-1=4. LOL!

Like I said - nothing special. Just water... and food (when I remember).
They get full sun just about all day.
The flowers themselves just bloom about a day or so. (They ARE "DAY" Lilies, after all) - but there are so many buds, there's always something open.
I deadhead regularly so that keeps them going.
I generally have 4 to 6 flowers on a stem.

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