Skip to main content

Hanging Basket Problems and Rescue

This summer weather or should I say the autumnal weather has been playing havoc with my hanging baskets.

 They are being drenched, yet not getting enough water. They are being blown about all over the place, then add in the rather chilly temperatures and grey sky.

 The plants are really unhappy, as you can see after another night of hard rainfall the petunias are looking really rather sad. The photos below show the damage the weather has caused.


They almost seem to be dying back and nothing is spreading as it did last year.




This has made me a little sad, but enough of that, what can I do to help them out.

 One problem has been a lack of water, I thought due to the fact it had been raining hard they would not need watering, I was wrong. I gave them a good water and added some liquid feed. I will check them every day come rain or shine to see if they need water. I will also feed once a week. I did not feed the hanging baskets at all last year but these guys need a helping hand.

 Deadheading, I deadhead them regularly but I really need to give them some time and attention. Especially after the hard rain fall, the flowers really suffer and need to be carefully dead-headed especially the flowers that have been damaged in the rain.

 I am hoping these simple steps will help them recover and maybe we can get some warm sunny weather and they can begin to flourish again.
It is not all bad news though, the Nemesia Ice Pink is doing really well.



The Osteopermum and the Argyanthemum with regular deadheading are abundant with flowers, a lesson learnt from last year.



Seeing these three plants do well has helped my confidence, as I was starting to question if it was the weather or my skills as a gardener.

Comments

  1. Green Fingered Blogger11 August 2017 at 12:35

    I've tried a different approach to hanging basket to try and deal with exactly the problem you've identified. This year I stuck to upright geraniums which need little water or feed, just deadheading, and trailing Bacopa and Helicrysums. The effect is much simpler than the traditional hanging basket exploding with plants everywhere, but I like it, and it is a lot lower maintenance, and the plants only suffer from lack of water during a really extended dry spell. At other times they don't need anywhere like the watering a conventional basket would.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Unknown11 August 2017 at 22:57

    I'm so bad at keeping plants alive - I really don't know where I go wrong, but on reading this, I have some ideas why my hanging baskets died! I really hope you manage to rescue them! They looked so beautiful last year :) Let us know how you get on, and thank you for linking to #Blogstravaganza

    ReplyDelete
  3. Note Me Happy12 August 2017 at 13:41

    Honestly, they look beautiful! It's just this rubbish weather we can't seem to shake off! Thanks so much for sharing with #Blogstravaganza xx

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Pleached Trees - Higher Privacy Solution

As you are aware we have had the new fence put in and are trying to find some ways to gain some privacy back, the new garden fence . Today I took the boys on a trip to one of my favourite places to look at trees and plants. English Woodlands located at Cross in Hand, East Sussex. We brought our laurel plants from them about 4 years ago, they were extremely good plants healthy, strong and have since flourished. As a nursery, they helped us choose what we needed and even told us to buy smaller ones as they would grow so fast, saving us money. I have been looking online and wondered if pleached trees maybe an answer to our height issue. What they should do is bring height to the fence but still allow light in. Now these are by no means a cheap and as always I am not sure if Mr MC&W is going to like them. So what is a pleached tree you ask?, to be honest, I only found out when frantically on google looking for  solutions for the new fence. A pleached tree is where som...
26 comments
Read more

Planting LolliPop Trees Elaeagnus ebbingei

I can not believe the day had finally arrived, the trees we had put so much thought into were going to be planted. We had the conifer and last shrubs removed and the whole area dug over and ready for the arrival of the LolliPop Trees Elaeagnus ebbingei. Finding Elaeagnus Ebbingei Area cleared and ready for the trees I was on the school run when they arrived. I walked round into the back garden to see five of the most beautiful trees in huge pots ready to be planted. Mr MC&W had chatted to the team that the trees need to be the same height despite there being a slight slope. Elaeagnus ebbingei all ready to be planted It was great to see the tape measure out checking the spacing between each one, as this was such a crucial part of the design. I can not believe how fast they got the first tree in and how polite they were when we suddenly realised it was overhanging the neighbours' boundary. They brought it forward no questions. First Elaeag...
7 comments
Read more

Feeding a Bee with sugar water

Have you ever been in the garden and seen a sad looking bee on the ground not really moving? You watch it for a while realising the poor little chap is really struggling. I have found several bees like this and tried to feed them sugar water. But my attempts to rescue them mainly ended with me trying to drown them, I was really not aiding them during their time of need. But I have finally developed a method that works so I thought I would share. Mix together white sugar with a little water so that it completely dissolves, RSPB suggests 2 tablespoons of sugar with one tablespoon of water. I used desert spoons but the same ratio. The advice is never to use honey or brown sugar.  This is what worked for me, move the bee to a paving stone, I used a strong leaf they tend to walk onto it, if not you can easily slide it under them, then drip a small amount of the sugar water in front of the bee. The bee will start to drink the sugar water and you will see it begin to get stronger. It...
26 comments
Read more