Best plants for patio pots..

As the weather warms, spending time outside becomes more and more important, and creating an attractive, colourful environment is one way to make that time outside even more enjoyable. Planting containers with flowering plants to create areas of interest in the place you love to sit and relax, or dine with friends and family, is a quick and easy way to bring some summer-long colour to your outside space, whether this is a balcony, a patio by the back door or decking in the sunniest spot.

A couple of pretty planted pots at the front door also offer a warm welcome to visitors – a seasonal smile, we like to think!

Before you rush off to the garden centre to buy everything you need, it’s best to assess the spot where you’re placing your plants and understand what environment they’ll be dealing with. In this way, you can choose the plants best suited to this and ensure the best results summer-long

1. Full sunshine, most of the day

If you’re placing your plants in an area which gets the sun for most of the day, you’re in luck, as some of the prettiest of patio plants love these conditions. Choose pelargoniums (or geraniums, as my mother called them) for their broad, furry leaves and masses of colourful blooms that just keep on coming. They don’t mind getting a bit dry (they’re used to a fierce heat), but you should water every day – morning or evening. You can also fill pots with petunia, and Busy Lizzie, blue or white lobelia (these look great around the edges of pots or borders, with their tiny flowers and great spread of growth) or pansies, dahlias or daisies. Fuchsias are another great option, and come in masses of different varieties – dancing skirts of deep purple and red, pastel pink petticoats or scarlet trumpets. These need quite a lot of water, so on dry and warm days water in the morning and evening. 

2. Largely in a shady spot

While you might have placed your chairs or table in a spot that gets the sun just when you need it, there are corners of patios and decking that don’t really get much sun, and  would benefit from being brightened up with colour patio planting. In this case, you’re probably best looking at foliage plants, rather than plants that are all about the flowers. Hostas, for example, come in many vibrant shades of green – from citrussy to blue-green, and from vast spreading leaves to tiny, clumping leaves – which means you can create a collection of three to five pots using varied Hostas to create something really eye-catching and interesting. In the early and mid summer they throw out tall, elegant spikes of flowers, in white, pale pinks or lilacs, too, adding more pretty to the pot.

Hostas are easy to care for. They prefer shade (they’re woodland plants) and need their roots kept damp, but not soaked, so water regularly but don’t drown them! Slugs and snails LURVE a hosta, though, so they will need regular checking (and slug pellets) or you will end up with lacy leaves.They are perennial plants, which is also a long-term cost saving, as they come back year after year. In autumn, just move the pots to a sheltered site – behind a garage or shed wall, under a hedge, for example, and then fetch them out, pull away the dead leaves and let them go again in spring.  If you do want flowers, begonias are quite happy in the shade and produce bright pink flowers over purple leaves. These look great in pots with foliage plants such as ferns and grasses, and will last through till the autumn. 

Patio planting to do right now

If you want to plant up your own pots, you need to get on it now. A visit to the garden centre will provide choices for pelargoniums, petunia and many more, already quite well grown on and ready to spring into action once potted up.

You could, alternatively, choose to buy a few ready made pots for some instant colour. This can be a pricier option, but if you don’t already have pots waiting to be planted, this will save you buying these, too, and leave you with pots ready to be planted up next year. 

Garden centres, supermarkets and DIY stores will have trays of plants ready to purchase and plant, but for something more specialist – like hostas – it’s worth doing a bit of research with a specialist grower.

When planting your patio pots, choose a peat-free compost, add some stones to the bottom of the pot for drainage (when it rains, you don’t want your plants sitting in a pond) and plant in groups of three or five, depending on the size of your pot. The roots will need some space to grow, or you won’t get any decent flowers. Leave an inch or so of space at the top of the pot, so when you water the plants, it doesn’t spill over the side with a crust of soil that will mess up your patio.

Eddie – Friday 2nd June 2023 (Picture used from Hartington Road, Chorlton)