Plants for Cold Winters

Every climate has its problems. In the interior and in mountainous regions, winter comes early and stays late, much to gardeners’ frustration. This may explain why gardeners in cold climates often create beautiful gardens. They may be the result of long winter nights spent planning and dreaming.

But don’t wait until summer to enjoy your garden. There’s entertainment out there even when it’s sparkling with frost and whipped by cold winds. Trees and shrubs offer dramatic silhouettes through every season, but the shapes of their limbs and the texture of their bark are most pronounced after leaves dropin autumn. Evergreens become even more endearing when they’re the only greenery in sight. Combined with plants that hold their form through winter, weatherproof garden features such as fences, walls, statuary and pillars offer reassuring evidence that both you and your garden are waiting patiently for spring. Meanwhile, stock a bird feeder with bird seed, chopped fruit and a clean bowl of water, provide a range of shrubs with berries, include some seed-laden ornamental grasses, and your garden will be assured of many appreciative winged visitors.

Stretching the season

For any gardener frustrated by a short season, one of the simplest coping strategies is to stretch the season as far as possible. In autumn, cover late-season performers with boxes, blankets, protective fleeces or floating row covers to help them survive the first few frosts. Lobelia, pansies and other diehard annuals will continue to bloom, but frost will cause impatiens and petunias to shrivel. Add bright colour to faded areas by using containers potted up with primulas or pansies.

Outside, stock your landscape with ornamental grasses that form buff-coloured silhouettes which remain attractive well into winter. To ensure that spring comes as early as possible, make liberal use of the early-flowering bulbs that bloom in winter, such as yellow jonquils and paperwhite narcissus. When you venture outdoors in late winter to admire the buds forming on spring-flowering trees and shrubs, it will double your excitement to find flowering bulbs, such as bluebells and daffodils, pushing up around your feet.

In most cool areas, japonica camellias can be relied on to transform winter gardens from drab to delightful. Camellias are true care-free plants that need little attention other than an occasional water and a good layer of mulch and well-rotted manure to keep them in bloom for months. To extend the flowering of camellias, look for varieties that flower in succession so there’ll be at least one variety in flower from late autumn to early spring. To make your selection, visit other gardens or specialist camellia nurseries which hold flower displays all winter long. If you live in an area with alkaline soils, grow camellias in large tubs filled with a potting mix for acid-loving plants to enjoy their winter color.

In woodland areas, try growing cyclamen around the base of the trees for the off-season charm of their little winged flowers, and let spring come early with the blooming of evergreen hellebores. Another care-free plant that provides colour in cold winter gardens is mahonia. Evergreen leatherleaf mahonia is a mainstay in many gardens with mild winters, both because it holds its foliage year-round and because its yellow flowers appear before winter has come to an end.

Snowy scenes

In the coldest areas, to keep dormant plants safe from winter frosts (if snow doesn’t come, or to increase its insulating effects if it does), cover dormant plants with loose evergreen branches after cleaning up the garden in late autumn. When you remove the branches in spring, don’t be surprised to see tender green shoots breaking through the soil slightly ahead of schedule. Stone walls, thickets of shrubs and other short barriers will provide the garden with extra protection from wind, while also breaking up the monochrome blanket and providing visual interest when the rest of the landscape is buried in snow.

Colourful containers

Although it’s winter on the calendar, it can be spring indoors, in sunrooms or on sheltered verandahs and balconies, thanks to the amazing number of winter-flowering indoor plants. One popular choice is florist’s cyclamen, which will flower for 6-8 weeks in a well-lit spot. Other plants to be enjoyed in winter include succulents in bloom, such as many of the kalanchoes, as well as poinsettias. The latter bloom naturally as the days start to shorten and are a great choice for long-flowering indoor colour during winter. As well as traditional red poinsettias, look for some of the small- and double-flowered forms, along with pink and white types, which are now available.

Pots of primulas will also brighten winter. They can be kept indoors on a well-lit windowsill, or planted outdoors in pots, or straight into the garden for a splash of winter colour.

Many nurseries specialise in selling pots of forced bulbs of spring favourites such as tulips, daffodils and hyacinths.You can buy these or create your own. However, it is possible to coax hyacinths into bloom by planting them in shallow dishes with a mixture of soil and pebbles tucked up to the necks of the bulbs, taking care not to cover the growing points of the bulbs.

These bulbs are so forgiving that many gardeners use any containers they have on hand for forcing bulbs. Later on, when the plants in bloom are ready to be displayed in high-visibility spots indoors, the less attractive pots can be temporarily slipped into more decorative brass or ceramic containers.

For the first 6 weeks after planting hyacinth bulbs in pots, keep the soil barely moist, and store the planted containers in a cool place, such as in a cupboard, garage or unheated verandah or stoep. Although there may be no visible signs of life from the bulbs, the roots are actively growing under the surface of the soil. After about 6 weeks, when shoots of green appear, move the pots to a bright location, but keep them cool. Continue to water the soil regularly, and enjoy the show as the leaves give way to dramatic flower spikes. After the flowers fade, discard the bulbs, because they will not bloom perfectly again. Bulbs forced to growin containers simply do not get the strong sunlight they need to store enough food to produce flowers the following growing season.

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