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Gardening

Find tips and tricks to make your garden or allotment flourish on our Gardening forum.

Planting for new raised beds

6 replies

hillbilly · 13/06/2014 20:51

I have just put in 2 new raised beds which are 240 x 40cm and about 40cm high. They are both West facing, sheltered and get direct sun for part of the day. It's a city garden which is mostly paved and I need some ideas for year round bloom with evergreen background. I was thinking to start with a scented climbing Jasmine but really want suggestions for the rest.

TIA!

OP posts:
Liara · 14/06/2014 19:30

Are they against a fence or wall or freestanding?

What is in front of them, do you want plants to stay within the confines of the beds or are you OK to have plants spilling over the edges?

hillbilly · 15/06/2014 00:05

They are against a fence and I don't mind spillage over (more in a floral way though). Would definitely like some plants of differing heights and plan for a climber in each to grow against the fence.

OP posts:
Liara · 15/06/2014 19:18

The great thing about raised beds is that you can put really great soil in them, which means that you can choose from an enormous array of plants.

I would choose a style that you like, and get things around that theme. In a city garden, where space is very limited and you need something to be of interest year round, I would make sure I have something with interesting foliage of some sort, which will still look good when there aren't so many flowers. I would choose one or two evergreens with foliage you like to provide that. Maybe something with reddish leaves.

Not that many things flower for a very long season, so the best thing is to plan for a succession of blooms if you want flowers all year. You don't have that much space, so I wouldn't get overly obsessed with that, or you might end up with something where there is one tiny bit blooming at any one time, with the rest not looking that great. Choose plants with many seasons of interest, rather than just when they are in bloom. Think of the colours of the leaves in autumn, or the stems in winter, for example.

Bulbs are a great way of cramming flowers and colour without taking up too much space. You can plant them in between perennials or other plants that then cover up the gaps they leave when they die down.

Another thing which may make sense is to put in a small tree in one of them. It can grow above the fence, breaking the line of the fence and providing a difference in heights, and you can plant underneath it. I love japanese maples for this kind of thing.

hillbilly · 16/06/2014 20:35

Thanks Liara for such an in depth response. I need something along the back, evergreen. Then maybe 2 other height levels including tall flowering plants and low ones spilling over the edge. I've never had much success with multi layered bulb planting esp with pots because I always have to reuse the pots so old stuff come out. I love yellow particularly, also purples, blues and foliage that have autumnal colour. If I could have flowers from April to October I'd be very happy Smile

OP posts:
hillbilly · 16/06/2014 21:09

This is the fence the raised beds will be against.

Planting for new raised beds
OP posts:
Liara · 17/06/2014 19:24

The problem I find with most evergreen climbers is that they can have quite a lot of depth - if your raised beds are only 40cm deep I would be reluctant to put something in that is going to take too much of that depth. If you don't mind that, and are happy to have mainly a climber with just a small border of things in front, then clematis armandii is evergreen and has white flowers (gets huge, though).

I was going to suggest ficus pumila, - which has the advantage of growing very close to the wall with tiny leaves, so will clad it in a fairly tidy manner, without taking too much space - but I see the RHS has it down as not frost hardy. Good thing mine can't read, it's been sitting on a north facing wall which sometimes gets to -15C.

A scented jasmine as you suggested could be nice too - again not the tidiest of climbers though, and you will have to make sure you train it up the fence.

Perennial wallflowers are of an intermediate level and flower for ages and ages. I have a raised bed where I have Erysimum bowles' mauve, verbena bonaerensis and lilies growing along rosemaries and eurporbias and it looks lovely for most of the year. There are also some irises, alliums, tulips and mini daffodils in there, with a blue convulvulus mauritanicus spilling over the edge. I don't think you could fit all of that in yours, but some of those could work for you.

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