Conservatory plants

[Pootles34]

I'm hoping someone can help me, as I'm close to giving in and buying fake plants! We've inherited an unheated conservatory. Typical conservatory issues - cold in the winter, hot in the summer - although not south facing.

I had dreams of a lovely jungly room but I'm struggling to find anything other than cacti and succulents that will like it, and I was hoping for a jungly effect. It doesn't freeze in there, but definitely gets to around 3/4 degrees Celsius so pretty chilly? Please help oh wise gardeners!

My aunt had an old wooden conservatory and I remember her growing plants with waxy little flowers that I think must have been hoyas.

Waxy leaved pelargoniums.

You can pick them up in b&q or Homebase for super cheap. They have ivy shaped leaves.

Don't buy the soft leaved ones.

Try a banana plant (musa basjoo). It is supposed to be hardy-ish in the UK anyway, so wouldn't mind going down to 3 or 4 degrees.

One thing you need to do with a conservatory in hot sunny spells is to provide shade, otherwise it will get far too hot in there and frazzle everything. You also need to keep the humidity up.

I have a very similar conservatory. My rubber plant is doing amazingly (it is taller than I am) and we also have a cordyline that has survived many winters and is now 11ft tall. We have a pothos in a hanging basket, geraniums in pots and a fire lily (Clivia miniata) too. Lastly we have a donkey tail that has done very well.

Same conservatory here. Not quite as cold - the lowest mine has got is 6 (Scotland)

I'm not sure anything absolutely loves it there as in the summer it's baking hot and dry and the winter cold. Doesn't stop me having loads of attempts though!

Probably most successful in terms of thriving is my Norfolk palm, rubber tree and dragon trees. My umbrella trees seem to grow lots too. I have a couple of ponytail palms and spider plants which are getting beast like. Pothos and philodendrons seem to do ok and all variety of snake plants do well. Oh my jade plant does well.

I tried bananas and they went very black looking - but didn't actually die so this year they are back in the house. My ficas dropped all of its leaves over night as well one year and a painted nettle just keeled over.

Things do dry out very quickly in the summer so I'm looking into an irrigation system.

For a quick jungle look lots of vine like plants look great either as vines or in a hanging pot.

I love my conservatory.

I had a big conservatory that faced north, the cacti loved it. For the winter I would sow a packet of hardy annuals in the late summer/autumn, and pot them along, and they managed to survive and flower all winter and bring a bit of jungly cheers. Schizanthus were a lovely show one year.

I have a Plumbago auriculata, not in a pot but on a south-facing balcony that gets hot in the summer but cold in the winter (but not freezing because it’s in a sheltered spot and it’s London. It sulks and the leaves die in winter but they grow back in spring and it has lovely flowers.

I also have two pelargoniums, one with leaves with that classic ‘rose geranium’ smell, and one of these:
www.fibrex.co.uk/products/p-cucullatum-flore-plenum

”Soft leaved” Pelargoniums work for me. And flower all the year round. Also Zygocactus/ Schlumbergia (Christmas and Easter cacti). Mine is south facing, and I don’t provide shade. The Pelargoniums are fine, and the cacti tolerate it.

Mine does get colder. One year I unthinkingly washed the floor and it froze.

Thanks so much all, some great ideas here! I'm quite excited to get going with my new shopping list. I would really like to make it work, as it's a lovely spot to sit in.

I used to have a conservatory. I had a lot of pelargoniums and hibiscus, a Hoya, and cyclamens in winter.