By Jackie Sledge
Big Country Master Gardener Association
I’m still working on my landscape and am having trouble deciding what to do next. I planted a couple of new shrubs, some perennials, and a few veggies and herbs all mixed together in my flower gardens, but I still have some room. Since I planted the shrubs and perennials with their mature size in mind, I don’t want to add more of them because I need to leave enough space to accommodate their growth for the next few years. What should I do?
In his book Lone Star Gardening, Neil Sperry says “Once you have the more-or-less permanent parts of your plantings (trees, shrubs and turf) in place, it’s time to turn to the fun part of landscaping – garden color. Annuals, whether flowers, foliage or even with fruit, are the best color tools in your toolbox.” Annuals. Of course. That’s the answer to what I need to add to flower beds to make them complete.
Here are some basic facts about annuals:
- Annual plants complete their life cycles from seed, germination, growth, flowering, seed production, and death all in one season.
- Some annuals reseed themselves, so plants come back every year from their own seed.
- Annuals must be replanted or replaced during the year since they die because of the summer heat or the winter freezes. Replacing annuals that are dying with new ones for the next season means there are no times without interesting plants in the landscape.
- Annuals aren’t the toughest plants, so you have to consider their location, proper sun/shade requirements, and water needs.
- Annuals add immediate interest in the landscape because they are already blooming or have attractive foliage when they are planted.
- Annuals provide color in the landscape for months so if you want maximum color for a long time, plant annuals.
- Annuals can be warm season and be planted in the spring to provide color in the summer and fall; cool season and be planted in the fall to provide interest through the winter and into spring; flowering to provide color in the landscape; or foliar with shape or color of leaves to add a ‘pop’ to the garden.
- Annuals are extremely versatile plants and can be planted in the ground, in planters, and in pots.
Warm-season annuals should be planted after the danger of a killing frost has passed so the soil temperatures will be warm enough for the plants to survive. If you have annuals that are struggling with extremely hot temperatures, you may need to replace them with more heat-tolerant annuals such as pentas, periwinkle, portulaca, or purslane to ensure color through the hot summer months. Cool-season annuals should be planted in late September or October to provide landscape interest during the winter. Examples of these are dianthus, pansy, snapdragon, plus ornamental cabbage and kale.
And now here are some considerations when planting warm-season annuals:
- A mass planting, an area filled with a solid planting of one color and one type of plant, is very striking (e.g., mass planting of geraniums).
- Another option is to use a variety of different annual plants in the same color in the bed (e.g., white vinca with white pentas). This is a variation of mass-planting a single type of plant.
- Small pockets of the same color planted in different areas provide unity throughout the landscape (e.g., all pink annuals in pockets throughout the landscape).
- Plant a single type of annual in multiple colors to make a stunning bed (e.g., red pentas, pink pentas, and white pentas).
- Use annuals to make a carpet (e.g., trailing periwinkle).
- Annuals can be used as border plants in front of shrubs (e.g., periwinkles).
- Plant annuals as fillers in containers or pots when using the thriller-filler-spiller method of container gardening.
Annuals are usually purchased as small plants from nurseries, garden centers, and box stores and are ready to be transplanted in your landscape. They can be purchased in different sizes from small (6 transplants in individual cells in a small tray), 4-inch pots, 6-inch pots, to large plants that are almost fully grown. Plant small transplants about 8 inches apart and large plants about 12 inches apart. The impact on your landscape is immediate!
An important lesson from personal experience: Purchase plants that are budding or in bloom, so you are sure what color you are buying. I bought a flat consisting of 20 4-inch pots of the same plant, but they were not all blooming. The tag on the flat said the plants were all the same color, and of course I believed that was true. I planted all 20 red vincas in an area where I wanted a mass planting of the same color and was very surprised and disappointed when I had several pink vincas scattered throughout the plants. Instead of pulling the pink ones out and replacing them with matching red vincas, I changed my thinking of the single-color bed to one with a variety of colors of the same annual planted together. Problem solved.
Nurseries, garden centers, and box stores get shipments of plants almost every week, and it can be overwhelming to walk into the greenhouse area and see so many plants and a sea of color. As tempting as it is to start filling the basket with plants, remember your plans for the landscape, the sun/shade requirements, each plant’s water needs, the color theme, the plant’s space requirements, and where there’s room in the landscape for more plants. Another word of warning, don’t be tempted to purchase annuals at the end of the season because they are on clearance. They won’t last long, and you will need to replace them with plants for the new season.
Final thought. I am always so excited to see the seasons change and the new plants come in so I can keep my landscape fresh and colorful and full and thriving. Thanks to annuals.
BCMGA offers several education programs each month. There is a program at 6:00 p.m. on the 1st Tuesday of the month at the South Library Branch in the Mall of Abilene, and the same program is offered again at 10:00 a.m. on the 2nd Friday of the month at the Downtown Library. There is a Saturday Seminar on the last Saturday of the month at 9:00 a.m. at the Taylor County Extension Office Conference Room. Watch the BCMGA website and Facebook page for the topics and dates of these monthly programs.
If you have any questions, call the Taylor County Extension Office at 325-672-6048 or email us at mgardeners@yahoo.com. We hope you visit bcmgtx.org for information on all Big Country Master Gardener events, like us on BCMGA Facebook, and check out training presentations on BCMGA YouTube. We are here to help you.
