Summer Superbells

I really dig the summer colors available with Superbells at the garden centers today on Southern Gardening.

This year I’m going to plant more of a hybrid called Superbells that like little petunias. There’s something about a funnel shaped flower that adds a little extra pizazz to the landscape. These are tough plants with good summer heat tolerance. One of the attributes I like about Superbells is that after a rain storm these plants will recover and perk up faster than many other of our summer flowering annuals. These plants look great in containers, hanging baskets and massed in landscape beds. In the past several years I’ve grown some pretty outstanding landscape performers. Cherry Star feature flowers that are bright cherry red and having a yellow starburst in the flower center. Lemon Slice is bright, cheerful yellow with a white pinwheel center pattern. Saffron flowers have golden yellow petals and red artist highlights in the center. This year I’m growing a new to me selection called Tropical Sunset. I love the flowers featuring a variety yellow and pinkish red streaks. Be sure to feed with controlled release fertilizer at planting and water soluble fertilizer will maintain the nutrition at optimum levels to keep the flowering non-stop. Superbells are tolerant of pruning and will stimulate more growth. In fact, trim any time the plants get a little untidy. Be sure to fertilizer right after these trimmings.

Until next time, I’m horticulturist Gary Bachman enjoying our Southern Gardening