Growing Hibiscus

 

Growing hibiscus is an easy way to add a tropical flair to your garden. When you know how to care for hibiscus plants, you will be rewarded with many years of lovely flowers. Let’s look at some tips on how to care for hibiscus.

Growing hibiscus in containers

Many people who are growing a hibiscus plant choose to do so in a container. This allows them to move the hibiscus plant to ideal locations, depending on the time of year. Hibiscus prefer a cozy fit when growing in a container. This means that they should be slightly root bound in its pot and when you do decide to repot, only give the hibiscus a little bit more room. Always make sure that your growing hibiscus plant has excellent drainage.

Temperatures for growing hibiscus

When you care for a hibiscus, you should remember that hibiscus flower best in temperatures between 60F – 90F and cannot tolerate temps below 32F. In the summer, your hibiscus plant can go outside but once the weather starts to get near freezing, it is time for you to bring your hibiscus indoors.

Watering Hibiscus

When hibiscus are in their blooming stage, they require large amounts of water. Your hibiscus will need daily watering in warm weather. But once the weather cools, your hibiscus needs far less water and too much water can kill it. In the winter, water your hibiscus only when the soil is dry to the touch.

Fertilizing Hibiscus

A growing hibiscus plant needs lots of nutrients in order to bloom well. In the summer, use a high potassium fertilizer. You can either use a diluted liquid fertilizer one a week, a slow release fertilizer once a month or you can add a high potassium compost to the soil.   In the winter, you do not need to fertilize at all.
These are the basics for how to care for hibiscus plants in your garden. As you can see, they are a easy maintenance, high impact flower that will make a garden in any part of the world look like a tropical paradise.

Late Summer Garden

Once the dog days of summer hit, flower gardens generally start looking tired. Colors wash out, edges brown, blossoms become fewer in number. But Catherine Mix needs glorious, color-filled beds from June to September. As co-owner of The Cutting Garden in Sequim, Washington, with her husband, Tom, she tends several acres of gardens that serve as a lush backdrop for weddings and other outdoor events and provide blooms for the bouquets and flower arrangements she creates. So she's discovered plants and strategies that deliver a brilliant show even in late summer. Here are some of her tricks that any homeowner can try:

Make it easy. Mix grows a wide array of plants, including long-blooming annuals like asters, cosmos, zinnias, sunflowers, lisianthus, and celosia. After planting, she mulches once with a 3-inch layer of rich compost to deter weed seeds, conserve soil moisture, and add nourishment. She also grows a number of flowers that self-seed in her beds. "If you don't weed too hard in spring, these come back every year," she says.

Shown: A brick walkway surrounded by vibrant blooms wends its way through an arch in this Spokane, Washington, garden. The plantings showcase some of grower Catherine Mix's favorites for late-season color: towering multicolored dahlias, as well as snapdragons (shown in white) that she keeps in bloom with constant deadheading.

this article is from This Old House site