What Hardy Bright Flowers Can I Buy For My Garden?
February 9th, 2010 | 
Author: Am kind of clueless about gardening but recently weeded my front garden which is sunny but part shade. Now it is just a lawn with beds round it, but at the moment there is nothing much in those beds (except i put a few primroses in).
I have a limited budget but I need flowers that are bright - as i have a kind of colour scheme in my mind, please don’t laugh! Also ones which are very easy to care for and if possible ones that don’t die in winter. Went to garden centre today and just stood there for hours wandering round and ended up buying more primroses and pansies!!! HELP! any names of easy to care for flowers which are widely available, I would be very grateful for! Some of them looked beautiful and exotic but like they would die the second i got them home!
Are chrysanthemums good? Azaleas?
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I’d try some sunflowers, which love sun, but are also fine in partial shading. Depending on the strength of those winds, you could aim for some of the dwarfer varieties. They now come in more colours than just standard yellows too, so you can make a fantastic display from just a few seeds.
If you’re at a garden centre now, and they have summer bedding plants that you like, beware that frosts will likely kill them, so I would wait a few more weeks for those. (Bedding plants are those annual plants that grow, flower and die the same year - they do make an impact, but have to be replaced each season - your instinct may have guided you wisely with some of those plants, which my local stockists have in abundance: I sometimes wonder if they hope they’ll die, so that they get to sell replacements too).
Calendulas and Californian Poppies, as well as other annual poppies are all very easy to grow from seed. I encourage you to grow some of the easier plants from seed, as a small packet will raise a huge number of plants, and hardy annuals, like these, can be sown in the soil outside, and don’t need a greenhouse and indoors growing first, etc. Places like Morrisons, DIY stores sell them quite cheaply, and I think Wilkinsons, if you have a local store, has 3 packets for the price of 2 at the moment.
Just watch out for slugs and snails eating small seedlings, as they can decminate a garden quite quickly - as it’s likely to be damp around you, they could be there ready to have a feast. Wilkinsons sell a great slug and snail killer that’s safe for pets, wildlife and the environment, made by a company called ‘Growing Success’. It’s worth having this as a remedy in hand.
Camellias are still flowering now, they’re a spring flowering evergreen shrub, and these are fairly widely available, worth considering for spring colour that’s perennial, and attractive as a bush even when not flowering. A little pricier than the average shrub though.
Otherwise, stick with trying some of those annuals from seed, which will fill huge borders easily, due to the volume of seeds per packet. The varieties I included vary from dwarf to taller, though it sounds like the tallest sunflowers, even with stakes, might get too wind damaged.
Hope this helps. Good luck! Rob
If you’re on a budget, consider buying seeds. Read the packets for information on whether they’re perennials (come up year after year) or annuals (which die in winter). The packets will also tell you the soil type, moisture and sunlight requirements. Buy a selection.
Some annuals grow and flower very quickly. With seeds, you can experiment at low cost and enjoy watching the plants come on. Have fun.
chrysanthemums are a good flower but they are autumn flowers. Azaleas are good but I don’t know if they will grow in your area.
Some nice ones are zinnias, marigolds, hyacinthes, muscari, snapdragons, salvias, gerber daisies. Your local garden center can be of greatest help to you in what is good for your area.
Buying flowers depends upon the area you live in. Let us know what area you live in and your color scheme and let’s see what we can come up with for you.
You can always take a walk around the neighborhood and see what the neighbors are growing, if it’s working in their garden they will probably make it in your garden as well. You can always ask the neighbors for some cuttings or seeds.
Forsythia is easy to take cuttings from.
Buddleja is also easy to take cuttings from.
Lavender is easy with cuttings and seeds.
Oriental poppies are really easy to sow, so is annual poppies and just collect the seeds and do the same next year.
Coneflowers are easy to sow but they won’t bloom the same year.
Bleeding heart is a nice plant that grows quickly.
Welsh poppy is very easy and can become a weed in your garden but it will not die and is bright yellow.
I live in Sweden so if it can make it through my winters it will make it through a scottish one
Mums are OK. Azaleas are pretty in bloom, but I don’t particularly like the bushes the rest of the year — NOT attractive (yo me). Gerbera daisies are pretty tough, easy to grow, and come in a rainbow of bright colors. Zinnias and peonies. Giant irises are beautiful. Impatiens are super easy and keep blooming for the longest, but they are not perennials.
Also, depends on weather in your gardening “Zone” of the country. Check with an expert at your local yard and garden store, Lowes, WalMart, etc., or the county extension service or arboretum or bontanical garden if you are near one. Free expert advice!!