Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Last Recap of the Creative Container Plantings for 2011

The cordalyine/Sedona/Kale container when planted around the 1st of June:


and now:

The Sedona coleus really took over, smothering out the blue salvia and the orange Gazania.  The Purple Heart survived, though I wish it had grown a bit larger. I would love to see it sticking out from the coleus.

Nonetheless, I really like this container.  I have kept the Sedona coleus flowers cut off all summer, but now that the end is near, I am letting them bloom.

Here is one of the garage urns when I planted them (that arrow is showing the where the Tropicanna is).  Do you remember that I said many of you would be surprised to see these urns in August?
 You have to admit, they look a lot different--from the front, you can barely see the urn today.
I want to see a bit more of the urn, so I went out and cut off some of the gorgeous Ipomea 'Rusty Red'.  I highly recommend this ipomea.  The outer leaves are rusty red while the under leaves are bright purple.  Cool!

The big striped leaves are what became of that little sprout in the first picture.

I nestled a pot of dahlias in the container where the black dahlia didn't grow.
I like the dahlia color with the Tropicanna leaves.  I am about 80% happy with these urns.  I wish the Trebbiano dahlia had not died out, but I think it's a bit too tall for these urns.  Next year I will probably plant something shorter.

Here is the big cobalt blue container that I was so gaga over when I planted it.

Unfortunately the big Tropicanna 'Gold' in the back (which you can't see in the pic above) did not get very big. So that was a huge disappointment. The entire color scheme was based on those striped leaves.
Luckily I happen to have a big pot of Tropicanna 'Gold' to show you what I had planned.
Aren't the leaves beautiful?  You can see that this container is about to flower. As with all the Tropicannas, the flowers are an orange shade.  Anyway......

If I put this container behind the cobalt blue container, you get a good idea of what I wanted this planting to look like.

I also expected more out of the yellow daises--taller and wider. There is some blue salvia in there, but it did not do well either.
What I did NOT expect was that the gorgeous yellow/green filler plant I chose ( Duranta erecta Golden Dewdrop 'Gold Edge'  ) would end up producing these 2-inch needle spikes!  I kid you not -- these things are sharper than my quilting needles! Ouch!!! As lovely as the foliage is,  I won't be using  Duranta erecta Golden Dewdrop 'Gold Edge'   again.


All in all, I am not all that gaga over this container.



Remember this sorry sight of the deck rail container with yellowed nasturtiums last week after it had no water for 4 days? 

 I cut the yellow off and in just a bit over a week's time it looks fairly decent.
Are nasturtiums known for yellowing of leaves?  It does seem that I have a lot of them on all of the nasturtiums I grew from seed this year.  I am forever picking off yellow leaves. 


16 comments:

  1. You have the most gorgeous container plantings. You have way more patience than I for that though. I really love that Canna.
    Cher Sunray Gardens

    ReplyDelete
  2. Your containers are gorgeous. I have the yellow/green foliage plant with the thorns planted in the garden. Nasturtiams foliage does yellow when the plant is stressed, my experience anyway.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Your containers are so pretty! You should come up and do mine!
    :D

    ReplyDelete
  4. Your containers are beautiful, even if they didn't live up to your plans. I don't have your eye for detail and I plant my containers in May with whatever I have/buy...you have good ideas that I might try next year :)

    ReplyDelete
  5. Now that's what gardening is all about, Zoey..planting and waiting to see what shows up:) You put so much work into your garden and pots, I hope you really enjoyed them as much as I did!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Zoey, you have the Touch with plants and color combinations. These are just gorgeous. I think you're onto something there with putting the canna pot right behind the other one...if you hadn't told me I would have thought they were all growing in one container.

    And what's up with the poky needles on the filler? Ouch, that looks nasty. My biggest problem has been that I plant too many things in my pots and then when the sweet potato vine or the coleus goes nuts, many of the expensive fillers are swallowed up by the exuberance of everything else. I have to learn to live with emptier pots for the first few weeks and curb my tendency to cram!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Zoey, I love your containers! The color combos are great. My favorite is the first one you showed and the one where you placd the canna behind it - they're stunners!
    Beth

    ReplyDelete
  8. Gorgeous containers.

    That duranta can turn into a giant bush/tree with the exquisite deep purple ruffled flowers edges in white that produce stunning yellow berries. perhaps transplant it into a larger pot, overwinter and let it really go to town next season.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Zoey, you really have me interested in growing plants in urns next year, yours are just fabulous! I need to write down which plants you used and see if I can get them over here. How fabulous my deck and patio would look...if I could get the plants growing like you do! lol xoxo

    ReplyDelete
  10. Thanks, Cher!

    Darla, I think it is a shrub in the southern states. Does yours get some sort of orb thing? Yes, whenever my nasturtiums get the least bit dry, they yellow. Very frustrating.

    Sue, Thanks. I would love to!

    Dorothy, I hope you do try some and send me the pictures. That would be so interesting to me!

    Hi Betty,
    I like my deck containers more than I enjoy my other gardens. If I had to keep only one, it would be the containers.

    Karen,
    Those needle things are nasty! they are sharp as razors!!

    Beth, Thank you so much!

    heidih,
    I had read that it would get some type of ball thing and I thought that would be wonderful. It must just be in the south??? In my cold climate it would never survive.

    Oh, Pea, what a great compliment! I hope you try some some containers next year!

    ReplyDelete
  11. I love what you've done with those containers!!! I struggle with deciding what to put together in my containers but i"m getting better and more daring :)

    ReplyDelete
  12. Thanks for letting me take a a beautiful evening walk through your flowers!

    ReplyDelete
  13. Zoey, You have such a great eye for planting containers. I love all your color and texture combinations. I just never put that much thought into it. Beautiful! Jean

    ReplyDelete
  14. You surely have the touch for picking plant combinations. I think next year I am going to plant a few big containers, instead of lots of small ones. I may ask for your help in combinations!

    ReplyDelete
  15. Wow! All your pots look gorgeous!!
    Love all your colors!

    I just signed on as your newest follower and would love for you to follow me.
    Have a wonderful day!!

    ReplyDelete

I appreciate you taking the time and effort to leave a comment. I will try to answer any questions you have. Please note due to Blogger changing word verification so almost nobody can read it, I have had to change to no word verification and only allow registered users to comment.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...