Your Garden Questions Answered
Episode: # 9 02/06/07
Presenter: Melissa King
Melbourne is dotted with quaint boutique-style nurseries, and Town and Country Gardens is a little oasis in the inner south-east.
If you are lacking space at ground level, why not suspend plants from balconies and porches with hanging baskets. They are tiny hanging gardens filled with flowers and foliage.
If you want the look, that does not use a lot of water or work then Pink Starburst (Sedum Hybrid Cultivar, ‘Starburst’) is sensational. It is tailor made for hanging baskets, with cascading stems covered in pretty pink flowers.
If you are after something a little bit different, make the most of coloured foliage with a display like Ornamental Kale (Brassica oleracea, Acephala Group) as a feature, surrounded by Silver Leaf Cineraria (Senecio cineraria ‘Silver Dust’). The key to great looking hanging baskets is to use a lot of water storing crystals!
The Chinese sometimes call the Jade Plant the Money Tree – because it is the ultimate symbol of prosperity, used to attract money into the house. Besides the fact that this plant has the potential to make you rich it is also a top indoor plant that requires little water or maintenance.
Getting plants in the ground now gives them time to establish before the heat kicks in again. So do not forget to include plants that are rewarding for your winter planning.
The old mop head hydrangeas are pretty, but the Oak-Leafed Hydrangea (Hydrangea quercifolia) is in a class of its own. It has been in flowering all summer and autumn. Even the dried bronze seed-heads are pretty, hanging on the plant into the cooler months. It really comes into its own in autumn when the oak-like foliage turns brilliant shades of orange and scarlet.
Autumn colour should not just be enjoyed at ground level. So add the Crimson Glory Vine to your shopping list too, for vibrant leaf tones on pergolas and fences.
When you see cyclamen appear in nurseries, you know the cooler weather is here. Melissa can’t think of a more sophisticated plant to brighten the garden at this time of year.
With their marbled leaves and elegant flowers in all shades from pale pink to deep salmon, white, rose and carmine. Bring their vibrant colour indoors in pots or plant dainty miniature types on mass beneath deciduous trees for an explosion of colour. There are even scented varieties for indoor fragrance.
If you have been wondering what that blue flowering shrub is that has been blooming in tough conditions all through summer and autumn its Plumbago auriculata a tough, adaptable plant that will grow in poor soil. It loves to be exposed to sunny conditions and it is dry tolerant! Grow it as a hedge or loose shrub and it won’t let you down.
And who could forget how much effort the salvias put in this past season flowering their socks off all summer long with little water and hanging on well into the cooler months.
Among the native plants, Fanflowers (Scaevolas) are stand-out performers. They are a top choice if you want pretty flowers cascading from a container in hot, dry conditions.
Town and Country Gardens is a water saver garden centre, proving that be it city or suburbia, dry or wet, we all want to create beautiful outdoor living spaces.
Town and Country Gardens
1280 Malvern Road
Malvern 3144
Ph: (03) 9822 9704
Presenter: Melissa King
Melbourne is dotted with quaint boutique-style nurseries, and Town and Country Gardens is a little oasis in the inner south-east.
If you are lacking space at ground level, why not suspend plants from balconies and porches with hanging baskets. They are tiny hanging gardens filled with flowers and foliage.
If you want the look, that does not use a lot of water or work then Pink Starburst (Sedum Hybrid Cultivar, ‘Starburst’) is sensational. It is tailor made for hanging baskets, with cascading stems covered in pretty pink flowers.
If you are after something a little bit different, make the most of coloured foliage with a display like Ornamental Kale (Brassica oleracea, Acephala Group) as a feature, surrounded by Silver Leaf Cineraria (Senecio cineraria ‘Silver Dust’). The key to great looking hanging baskets is to use a lot of water storing crystals!
The Chinese sometimes call the Jade Plant the Money Tree – because it is the ultimate symbol of prosperity, used to attract money into the house. Besides the fact that this plant has the potential to make you rich it is also a top indoor plant that requires little water or maintenance.
Getting plants in the ground now gives them time to establish before the heat kicks in again. So do not forget to include plants that are rewarding for your winter planning.
The old mop head hydrangeas are pretty, but the Oak-Leafed Hydrangea (Hydrangea quercifolia) is in a class of its own. It has been in flowering all summer and autumn. Even the dried bronze seed-heads are pretty, hanging on the plant into the cooler months. It really comes into its own in autumn when the oak-like foliage turns brilliant shades of orange and scarlet.
Autumn colour should not just be enjoyed at ground level. So add the Crimson Glory Vine to your shopping list too, for vibrant leaf tones on pergolas and fences.
When you see cyclamen appear in nurseries, you know the cooler weather is here. Melissa can’t think of a more sophisticated plant to brighten the garden at this time of year.
With their marbled leaves and elegant flowers in all shades from pale pink to deep salmon, white, rose and carmine. Bring their vibrant colour indoors in pots or plant dainty miniature types on mass beneath deciduous trees for an explosion of colour. There are even scented varieties for indoor fragrance.
If you have been wondering what that blue flowering shrub is that has been blooming in tough conditions all through summer and autumn its Plumbago auriculata a tough, adaptable plant that will grow in poor soil. It loves to be exposed to sunny conditions and it is dry tolerant! Grow it as a hedge or loose shrub and it won’t let you down.
And who could forget how much effort the salvias put in this past season flowering their socks off all summer long with little water and hanging on well into the cooler months.
Among the native plants, Fanflowers (Scaevolas) are stand-out performers. They are a top choice if you want pretty flowers cascading from a container in hot, dry conditions.
Town and Country Gardens is a water saver garden centre, proving that be it city or suburbia, dry or wet, we all want to create beautiful outdoor living spaces.
Town and Country Gardens
1280 Malvern Road
Malvern 3144
Ph: (03) 9822 9704
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