Plant spotlight
‘Kit Oxtoby’
Introduced in 1990, this is a superb choice for any basket. The fully double flowers are freely produced – where most fuchsias produce one bud at the base of each leaf ‘Kit Oxtoby’ usually produces two, so you get a really spectacular display. The salmon pink and white flowers open from fat, white buds all summer and are of medium size.
10 Garden Answers
fuchsias
topten baSket fuchSiaS Geoff Stebbings picks out the fuchsias guaranteed to create a fabulous summer display ‘Dawnstar’
Although this can be grown as a bush or a standard fuchsia, the large, heavy flowers, packed with ruffled petals, really demand that you plant it in a basket. Then the stems will be laden with large flowers in cream and lavender and mauve. The base of the white sepals is tinged with deep pink and the tips are green while the petals are lavender when the flowers first open but age to mauve. Pinch out early to ensure a dense habit.
‘Anne Silveria’
Included in garden centres as part of the Goldrush series, ‘Anne Silveria’ is a bushy fuchsia with a semi-trailing habit that makes it good for containers as well as baskets. It has dense foliage, each leaf thinly edged in butter yellow and the new growth flushed with maroon and it is colourful even when not in bloom. The flowers are not large but the combination of deep red and purple contrasts well with the leaves. Naturally bushy in habit, it is an easy way to fill baskets with colour all summer.
Garden Answers 11