GARDENING : Summer Flowers Make a Real Basket Case
Whether displayed en masse or as a single dramatic accent, flower-filled hanging baskets add softness and color to a landscape. These cylindrical balls of cascading color bring beauty to eye-level space, camouflage unsightly views or even just enhance a favorite leisure place.
Victoria, British Columbia, attracts visitors from around the world each year with its lush gardens, including hundreds of brilliant flower baskets hanging from lampposts along the city’s major thoroughfares. Petunias, marigolds, trailing ivy geraniums and lobelia are planted each spring and fill the air there with their fragrance and color.
With minimal investment of time and effort, Orange County gardeners can enjoy their own color baskets this summer.
Paul Edwards has filled his Anaheim patio with colorful hanging bowls of his own creation. He’s so dedicated to this form of gardening that he’s installed an automatic misting system in his 30-foot by 18-foot covered patio to ensure the health of his basket-dwelling plants.
“Color is liveliness, happiness,” Edwards said. “The baskets brighten up the patio and make it lively.”
Although many pre-planted hanging baskets are available at nurseries and garden centers, Edwards enjoys creating his own.
He uses a combination of flowering and foliage plants, often planting a brightly hued plant, like Anthurium or coleus in the center, and surrounding it with trailing foliage plants like variegated ivy or types of ferns. He also uses tuberous begonias, impatiens and ivy geraniums.
Edward even grows baskets indoors and has equipped his living room with special lights for his fern-filled and ivy creations.
Hanging baskets can be planted as bright color spots showcasing one type of plant, like fuchsias, begonias or impatiens, or they can be color balls of assorted plant materials.
The traditional method of creating a wire hanging basket is to line the container with pre-soaked sphagnum moss. The basket is filled with potting soil, and plants are added. Some baskets are planted from the top only; more commonly, wire baskets are planted around the sides as well as on the top. The result is literally a bowl of color.
Ted Mayeda, owner of M&M; Nursery in Orange, is an expert in the art and science of creating hanging baskets. The nursery, founded by his parents in 1956, has specialized in hanging baskets for 15 years.
Last year, he and his brother, Ken, invented a new type of liner that makes it easier to create and maintain hanging baskets.
“We needed a lining for hanging baskets that was simple, attractive and water efficient,” Mayeda explained. The plastic liner covered with a green synthetic fiber, which they named “E-Z Liner,” is designed to drop in into a wire basket and have potting soil and plants added.
The prepared liner is clean, retains water, and plants thrive in it, said Mayeda. The traditional moss-lined baskets have a tendency to dry out or leak water and dirt as the bowl ages.
Another popular style of hanging flower display is in redwood tubs or containers suspended by a chain or wire handles for eye-level color, although planting is only possible at the container tops.
But Mayeda recommends that wire baskets displayed in sunny locations should also be planted only in the top so the plant doesn’t dry out too quickly.
“If baskets are for sunny location, we don’t plant the sides because the container dries out quickly,” he explained. “Just one missed watering can mean the plant will die.”
Instead, Mayeda recommends a showy display of one large, cascading type of sun-loving plant elevated to highlight its beauty.
He suggests using the following in sunny areas:
Bougainvillea, dwarf or compact forms--B. rosenka, with peach colored-flowers; B. brasiliensis (purple flowers); or B. James Walker, a pink-flowered variety that blooms so heavily that it needs periodic trimming.
Also, Begonia Richmondensis; Ivy geraniums (Pelargonium peltatum); Impatiens, New Guinea or standard; Petunias, especially the new cascading varieties; Verbena.
For shady areas, the following plants are recommended:
Begonias, along coastal regions this includes tuberous; Fuchsias (especially good in spring months); Ferns like Swordfern and Boston.
Mayeda also encourages gardeners to be creative.
“You can plant herbs together with flowering plants for a lush contrast,” he said. “We’re experimenting with growing tomatoes and Kentucky Wonder beans.”
Plants growing in hanging baskets need more attention than those in the ground because the roots dry out faster. Water daily, especially on hot or windy days. When Santa Ana winds blow, a second watering may be necessary.
All this water tends to leach nutrients out of the potting soil, so the plants will grow better with regular fertilization. Mayeda recommends using time-release dry fertilizer like Gro-Power or Osmocote in the potting soil when the basket is first created. Then he also suggests using additional water-soluble fertilizer like Miracle-Gro diluted to one-half the recommended strength every three to four weeks.
To look their best, these containerized gardens should also be trimmed or pinched as the plants grow. Pinching back leggy growth encourages the plants to grow fuller and flower more. Removing the spent blooms will also encourage new flower production.
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Materials to create hanging baskets are carried at all nurseries.
E-Z Liners are available at M&M; Nursery, 380 N. Tustin Ave., Orange, or by mail order. Prices start at $5.49 for a 12-inch round or 14-inch shallow liner, and range to $14.99 for a 24-inch round liner. Complete kits of liner, wire basket and wire hangers are also for sale, at prices ranging from $14.99 to $36.50. For information, call (714) 538-8042.
Other nurseries that carry the liners include Laguna Hills Nursery and Green Thumb Nursery in El Toro and Santa Ana.
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How to Assemble a Hanging Basket
Planting a round basket:
* Line wire basket with sphagnum moss or prepared liner. Fill the basket about one-third with potting mix.
* Pull the wires apart where you want to insert plants along the sides. From the inside, push with your finger to mark where you want to insert the plant, then make a cut in the liner from the outside.
* Insert scissors lengthwise at the outside of the liner and cut to make a slit about 3 to 4 inches long.
* Insert the plants into each panel. If you’re using four-inch plants, first soak the root ball to gently remove excess soil from the roots.
* Place additional planting mix in the container and insert plant in top.
* Hang in desired location with chain or wire and water thoroughly.
Planting a top-only basket:
* Line wire basket with sphagnum moss or prepared liner.
* Remove the plant you intend to use from its container. Place some potting soil in the bottom of the basket and place the empty container in the center. Add potting soil around the pot and pack down.
* Remove the empty container and drop in the plant.
* Hang in desired location with chain or wire and water thoroughly.
