by Hannah Miller | Jan 20, 2016 | Expert Update, Flowers, Gardening Posts
Growing petunias – Our blogger Hannah gives some helpful hints and tips
Growing Petunias will provide sunny positions in your garden with months of colour. They are one of the easiest summer bedding plants to grow; with a few tips they will look stunning in your sunny seasonal displays!
Petunias are easy to grow from both seeds and plugs. However, plugs will provide an established plant in a much shorter time. If growing from seed, sow around 10 weeks before you want to get them outside. Petunias can be planted into your chosen container as soon as we say goodbye to the spring frosts.
With many weather resistant varieties now available, they are much more tolerable to rain. In addition to this, breeding of new varieties has developed climbing petunias such as our own Petunia ‘Purple Rocket’. This exclusive double flowering Petunia grows rapidly and produces a tower of purple once established on a frame.
Petunia ‘Purple Rocket’
Petunias love the sun so place in a bright place in the garden and the plants will flourish.
If planting in containers, mix in a fertiliser such as Incredibloom into the compost when planting. The high potassium content will boost the plants nutrients and ensure prolific flowering throughout the season.
In order to help the plants last throughout the season, deadheading is vital. Petunias produce so many flowers, that the seed will naturally follow. As the plant is putting all energy into producing seed, it doesn’t make so many new flowers. In order to keep the plants in top condition, removing the faded flowers will help the plant make new buds and keep it to a good shape before it gets too leggy. Some varieties will benefit from pinching early to keep a nice bushy shape to the plant, particularly in baskets or pouches. Ensure the flower is pinched back close to the stem, removing the whole part of the flower. If only the petal is removed the plant will continue to produce seed.
Petunia ‘Stars In Their Eyes’
It is also important to not let the plants dry out, as this will slow growth. Keep the container moist at all times, however keep the balance and don’t let the plants ‘sit’ too wet. When watering, try to avoid getting the petals wet as this will prolong the life of the flowers.
Keep an eye out for pests and diseases on your plants. Aphids camouflage very well onto the colour of petunia leaves! If you can take action as soon as you see them as they distort the new buds. Later in the season, powdery mildew can sometimes become a problem with the British weather. If you have any bicarbonate of soda in your baking cupboard, mix a solution of 10gm of bicarbonate of soda per litre of water and spray onto the affected area.
Assistant Nursery & Site Manager
by Kris Collins | Jan 6, 2016 | Expert Update, Flowers, Gardening News, Gardening Posts
2016 – Thompson & Morgan Petunia Parade is here to celebrate a national favourite
Thompson & Morgan is kick starting a 2016 Petunia Parade with the launch of several hot new petunias in its spring catalogue. We are aiming to inspire UK gardeners and change some out-dated attitudes to an unsung garden hero.
Announcing the initiative, Thompson & Morgan Communications Officer, Kris Collins said: “There’s a certain amount of snobbery in some circles when it comes to Petunias. Some gardeners turn their noses up, but these showy summer performers remain popular for a reason. No other plant offers such diversity in terms of garden use, colour scheme, growth habit and ease of growing. There’s something for everyone in our 2016 Petunia selection – colour, shape, style and even scent. If you grow our latest introduction, people will be turning their noses up for a very different reason!”
The seed and young plant mail order specialist is bringing high scent to the genus with new Petunia ‘Purple Rocket’. Double flowers mean MORE petals and MORE fragrance. Just one pot of this climbing beauty will fill the garden with scent all summer. All introductions for 2016 have been selected for their performance under UK growing conditions, blooming right up to the first frosts of autumn – expect to see giant flower forms that will bounce back after summer showers.
The Petunia Parade is not just about showing off the fantastic range of Thompson & Morgan Petunias – including its star performer ‘Night Sky’, a truly unique variety and a world first in flower patterning. The Parade will be fully backed via www.thompson-morgan.com/petunia-parade
Customers will be able to log on for top growing advice, planting and training ideas, petunia growing blogs and stunning images and easy how-to videos – all supplied by Thompson & Morgan’s team of experts.
Customers will be encouraged to join in the parade, sharing their passion for Petunias and posting their progress through the season. The seed and young plant specialist is also looking for the best British petunia display – be it a small container display or a mass bedding scheme. Gardeners can send in their photos through the season for a chance to win £100 of Thompson & Morgan vouchers. Ten runners up will each receive a £10 voucher. Competition closes 30th September. Visit Thompson & Morgan Competitions for details.
Thompson & Morgan Petunia Highlights 2016
Petunia ‘Purple Rocket’
An exclusive double flowering Petunia from the Thompson & Morgan breeding programme.
Rapid growth and early flowering produces the ultimate column of colour when trained on a frame. Just three plants set into a Thompson & Morgan Tower Pot™ will create a winning summer patio or balcony display. Bred in the UK to cope with British weather, long stems quickly reach up to 1.8m (6ft) in height come rain or shine.
View Petunia ‘Purple Rocket’ Here
Petunia ‘Night Sky’
This new Fleuroselect Gold winner brings unique flower markings to the petunia market. Compact semi-trailing plants are covered in starry blooms. There’s no need for a telescope to star gaze, you’ll find a constellation in every flower!
View Petunia ‘Night Sky’ Here
Petunia ‘Easy Wave™ Ultimate Mixed’
This customer favourite just keeps on getting better! Rapid growth, a unique prostrate habit and prolific blooms make Petunia ‘Easy Wave™’ adaptable to almost any garden situation – it even makes an excellent ground cover plant! New for 2016, the mix now has 18 vibrant colours, ensuring there’s something for everyone to enjoy from this best seller.
View Petunia ‘Easy Wave™ Ultimate Mixed’ Here
For more new petunia varieties visit: www.thompson-morgan.com/petunia-parade
Kris Collins works as Thompson & Morgan’s quality control manager, making sure customers new and old are kept up to date on the latest plant developments and company news via a wide range of media sources. He trained in London’s Royal Parks and has spent more than a decade writing for UK gardening publications before joining the team at Thompson & Morgan.
by Caroline Broome | Aug 14, 2015 | Gardening Posts, Your Stories
It’s been a busy summer, what with the new shed roof terrace, the beach hut themed patio makeover and the plans for our new front garden.
This is the first year that the greenhouse has really been used to its full potential; it’s a veritable salad factory! Our 8ft x 5ft greenhouse is home to 2 cucumber Mini Fingers Cucina, 3 bush tomatoes Losetto and 3 cordon tomatoes Sungold, along with 15 varieties of chillies and sweet peppers, a spare courgette Defender from the allotment, an aubergine and some of last year’s leftover strawberry runners. Despite cramped conditions, good housekeeping and regular attention has resulted in an early and abundant crop of cucumbers, several promising tomato trusses and dozens of peppers; even the aubergine has 4 flowers on it – beginner’s luck perhaps. Having said that, the tomatoes are trying to climb out of the skylights and the cucumber vines are being suspended across the entrance on string! I’m looking forward to harvesting the produce to make my favourite Gaspacho soup.
The emphasis on colour has shifted somewhat from the main body of the garden, now that the towering tree lilies have finished flowering, to the basket and container displays on the patio. Begonia Apricot Shades Improved combined with lime green and black ipomaea foliage is a winner, blooming away through drought, rain and wind, no deadheading needed. The two hanging baskets of Petunia Peach Sundae just keep on flowering; daily deadheading and the occasional haircut keeps them compact and good as new. A couple of extra plugs crammed into the window box are the perfect match for the pastel striped bench beneath, although sitting on it is out of the question now that they are trailing over its back!
Calibrachoa Ruby Buttons, although slow to get going, is flowering away in a hanging basket brightening up a neglected corner. Bidens ‘Hawaiian Flare Orange Drop’, selected to hang above abutilons megapotamicum and Kentish Belle, has produced an abundance of vigorous ferny foliage but very few flowers, although they are starting to bud up now, better late than never. Fuchsia Eruption hasn’t stopped flowering for weeks and needs no maintenance other than the occasional feed and regular watering. Pots of begonia Glowing Embers are having a tough time due to Fred our oriental cat’s tendency to treat them like a running buffet, so perhaps they will have to be displayed in hanging baskets next year instead of ground level. I find begonia tubers really easy to overwinter so I see no reason why these ones can’t be rescued at the end of the season.
But surely one of the most striking additions to the garden has been the planting scheme for the shed roof terrace. I’ve been able to indulge myself with all the plants that I have never been able to grow at ground level due to slugs & snails and heavy clay soil: echinacea, helianthus, red hot pokers, heleniums, rodgersia, interwoven with tall grasses – and bubbling up through them all is Nasturtium Jewel of Africa, tumbling down the sides of the shed almost to ground level, a froth of huge marbled leaves and fiery flowers! And all from one packet of seeds. That’s what I call value for money.
As for the new front garden, watch this space…..work should start in September.
Caroline Broome has been gardening for more than 20 years. Having passed the RHS General Certificate, she has since developed her East Finchley garden into a “personal paradise” that she and her husband invite the public to visit each year via the National Garden Scheme. Learn more about our contributor using T&M’s ‘Meet the experts’ page.
by Steve Woodward | Feb 3, 2014 | Customer Trial Panel
A short update regarding a couple of plants which are still surviving the winter now in to February.
Geranium ‘T&M’s Choice Mixed’ F1 Hybrid & Petunia ‘Easy Wave’
I have 2 plants which are still alive outside now into February. One is a zonal geranium (pelargonium) and the other, which is not just one, but a number of plants of petunia. These are in various locations around the back garden, the geranium is in a clay pot on the front wall. Neither have had any special protection, other than the geranium has a wall for protection from one side, it has got a bit straggly now. Normally I would have taken this in the greenhouse late autumn for cutting material, but the longer it has lasted, the more curious I am to see how much more it can survive. The petunias actually look quite green and healthy.
To be honest, it has not been a severe winter yet, we have had a fair number of frosts around here and some bad enough to leave car windscreens in need of a defrosting before setting off for work, but not the prolonged deep frosts that usually put paid to bedders well before now. Last year wasn’t too tough a winter either, but we did get a few early severe frosts around November/December that finished off many borderline plants outside.
The pictures here are of a zonal geranium (pelargonium) which has been outside since late spring 2013, and petunia plants which are dotted around the garden in various containers.
I will update further on their progress through the winter months.
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Zonal geranium (pelargonium)
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Petunias
I am 56 yrs young, and have been married to Joy for over 35 years, We have 2 children and 3 grandchildren, and have an allotment on the Notts/Derbys border. I am RHS trained to level 2 and have also passed a course in herbalism, I have had the allotment for about 20 years, that is mainly for the veg growing, whereas at home I grow fruit and have a love of anything big leaved, exotic-y looking, jungly type plants. I also help run a gardening forum at garden-friends.co.uk.
by Bijal Mistry | Jul 29, 2013 | Customer Trial Panel, Flowers
I love petunias but with last year’s awful weather I was reluctant to grow them this year – I did not want to have another year of soggy flowers.
As usual when the T&M plants catalogue came in spring there were so many new and unusual petunias I just could not resist giving them another chance this year. And with all the sunny weather we have had recently I am so glad I did. They have gone from being bushy green leaved plants to being completely covered in flowers.
My favorites so far are the Crazytunias – ‘Wedgwood’, ‘Strawberry Cheesecake’, ‘Banoffee Pie’ and ‘Sophistica Bicolour’. It’s just amazing how Mother Nature can come up with such amazing colour combinations!
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Petunia ‘Banoffee Pie’
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Crazytunias
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Petunia ‘Sophistica Bicolour’
Petunia ‘Black Cherry’ is such an amazing colour, almost black! I am already thinking of plants I can combine with it for next year. And am also hoping it is still around at Halloween this year as it will make a spooky addition to the decorations!
Petunia ‘Black Cherry’
The other reason I love petunias is their scent. They have such an spicy exotic fragrance I don’t know why more fuss isn’t made over them. I wish someone could capture this scent in a candle as I would certainly buy it.
I find the best varieties for scent are Petunia ‘Tidal Wave’ and also the ‘Tumbelina’ range which have lovely double flowers as well as strong perfume. This year I have managed to find 16 different varieties of ‘Tumbelina’ and as a result had to invest in a new hanging basket stand to hang them all from. It’s still early but the stand is already looking good!
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Petunia ‘Tidal Wave’
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Tumbelina basket stand
Mesembryanthemums love the sun and the flowers are so jewel like. The leaves of these plants are so unusual too. They look like they have ice crystals all over them.
Mesembryanthemum
I am a huge fan of exotic plants and this year I have grown schizanthus ‘Dwarf Bouquet Mixed’ from seed. The flowers are really unusual and look like mini orchids.
Schizanthus
Also earlier this year I came across some caladium bulbs at a flower show. I have seen these plants in America but never in the UK. They were potted into pots and kept in the conservatory. The leaves are like stained glass windows and are so paper thin you can almost see through them. They are so fast growing which is really surprising, considering how little chlorophyll is actually in the leaf. I am searching everywhere for more varieties. If anyone out there knows where I can get some from please let me know!
Caladium
Well that’s all for now. Need to get back outside and continue watering!
As a member of Thompson & Morgan’s customer trial panel, Bijal Mistry tests plants, bulbs and seeds in his own garden on the outskirts of Manchester. He has won several awards and is happiest tending to his garden, especially the begonias and poinsettias!
Learn more about Bijal on the Thompson & Morgan blog here.
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