Pacific Northwest Gardening: Slugs and Salal

All-Season Container Inspiration and Instructions

CREATIVE AND COLOURFUL CONTAINERS
by Graham Strong and Claire Phoenix (Cavendish, 208 pages, hardcover, $24.95).

The bulk of this book is devoted to over 60 container projects, arranged by season. As the book lies open there is a full-page color photo of the planting on the right.

The left hand page features more photos, of the planting-in-the-making, along with a list of the plants used, a description of the container, a numbered sketch to indicate the placement of each plant, step-by-step directions for assembling the planting, and tips for extending its ornamental value beyong the indicated main period of interest.

A considerable introductory section is filled with more ideas -- for permanent outdoor container plantings, for striking color themes, and for positioning pots and decorating doorways -- all illustrated with color photography.

Among the many summer container arrangements is one titled Monkey Business, a combination of orange-red monkey flowers (Mimulus) with trailing mauve-blue lobelia, and two yellow-leaved plants -- Lysimachia nummularia 'Aurea' (creeping Jenny) and Lamium maculatum 'Aureum' (dead nettle) in a terracotta pot. The recommended location is in half sun or full shade. For continuity, the authors suggest replacing the monkey flowers when they fade with dwarf coneflowers or potted chrysanthemum.

Cottage Pot uses a lady's mantle as a filler plant for blue cornflowers, red cottage pinks, and purple ageratum. Cheap and Cheerful, another summer project, is a low cost planting that combines seed-grown lobelia and golden Bidens aurea with rooted cuttings of verbena, impatiens, and Surfinia petunias.

For fall, Autumn in the Air uses a broad plastic trough to house dwarf blue Michaelmas daisies with the multicolored Houttuynia, a variegated fuchsia, and trailing knotweed. Among the winter projects, a Christmas Trug with a gold and green color scheme includes a dwarf golden thuja, a variegated holly-leaved osmanthus, a gold-spotted aucuba, and vareigated ivy, euonymus and hebe.

An inspiring book. I'm heading outdoors now to lift some pieces of the highly variegated Ajuga reptans 'Burgundy Glow' from the garden to plant in a hanging basket for the partly shaded front of the house.

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