Bluest of the blues
Nope, we are not talking about the Blue Bulls rugby team. If you love blue, lobelia are the garden flowers for you. These cool-season flowers add dazzling colour from autumn through to early summer.
Lobelia come in all shades of brilliant blue and the newest is lobelia Curaçao® ‘Blue Bay’ that’s like a breath of seaside air! Its blue-white flowers ripple like frothy waves over the sturdy, compact plant.
Curacao Blue Bay is a strong growing lobelia that quickly fills out into a 25cm mound. It’s good for containers, or in the garden as a border and with other yellow, orange, pink or white flowers. Think alyssum, diascia, nemesia, pansies, and violas. Try it as an underplanting for roses in pots too.
The compact Curacao lobelias are taller, stronger growing plants, with bigger flowers, than the traditional bedding lobelia. If planted close together, about 20cm apart, they produce a mass of flowers. Other flower colours are deep blue, light blue, dark purple and amethyst.
Growing tips
- Being cool season flowers, they prefer sun in winter and semi-shade in summer.
- Plant in well composted soil that drains well.
- Do not over-water as this encourages root rot. Give plants a trim to keep them neat.
Hanging baskets and containers
The trailing Curacao lobelia is not a trailing variety in the true sense, because it grows up and then spreads to quickly fill a basket or container, rather than cascading downwards. Being heat tolerant it is more suitable for baskets and it delivers a ball of blue flowers.
What it needs:
- Show it off in a position that receives morning sun and afternoon shade.
- Water the basket every second or third day in autumn, less in winter and increase watering in spring when the days warm up. Don’t let the soil dry out completely.
- Feed with a liquid fertilizer like Margaret Roberts Organic Supercharger once a month, to keep it growing and flowering strongly.
- Trim if necessary to keep the basket looking neat.
Other garden tasks for autumn
- Nurture your flowers by watering once a week and feed with a granular or liquid fertiliser once during the month.
- Rake up all the fallen leaves and use them as mulch or add them, together with summer annuals that are over, to the compost heap.
- Fertilise shrubs with 5:1:5 or 8:1:5 to strengthen them for winter. Water camellias and azaleas regularly to encourage the development of spring buds.
- Wait until night temperatures drop to 10 or 12˚ C. before planting pansies, violas, Iceland poppies, snapdragons, calendula and primulas.
- Start planning and preparing beds for spring bulbs. Buy bulbs early before they are sold out but only plant towards the end of March and in early April.
- Keep your lawn green during winter by fertilising now with Ludwig’s Vigorosa and water regularly.
