Best planting time for perennials

Thought I might throw this up for debate. When do we consider is the best time of the year to get perennials planted in the border? I'm not talking delicate/half hardy things like penstemon, but your bog standard herbaceous perennials like achillea, cransbill, leucanthemum, etc, etc, etc.

I've experimented with autumn and spring with varying and different results. Some things have benefited from acclimatising over winter and flowered wonderfully the following year, others haven't. The oriental poppies I planted this Spring have given a great show in their first year, but lupins I like to get sown now and plant out in autumn.

I also ask as I am redesigning a couple of borders this autumn and would like to get things in then rather than wait with bare borders until spring - I can also plant bulbs amongst them so the dying foliage in subsequently hidden in summer.

Any thoughts?

 

One of my issues with this is finding the plants. In spring, by the time they are sprouting, and I can find them!, I'm very busy with other gardening tasks, and time is getting tight to get them transplanted before a dry spell knocks them back.

So I think late Autumn suits me better ... but before they die down totally and I can't find them :thumb:

 

Hmmm am obviously doing it all wrong. I just plant whenever I purchased them lol

I guess most of it is done about march/april time which is when all the garden centres start stocking the plants I tend to like so once purchased I plant them in any gaps I still have.

Then I wait for last years to come back up. On the odd time something hasnt survived the winter then I replace again - but not until about end May/early June time which gives them plenty of chance to re-survice.

On another note - I have put off ordering the lavenders I want because the weather was just too hot (rather someone else be trying to keep them alive than me this week!) .... but once I order them I will keep them in pots till about September. Then planning on planting them with chicken wire round them (make them more noticeable to people with big feed!). This will be a first for me though planting anything at that time of year.

Its interesting you sow you Lupins now to plant in Autum, as I have said before, my grandad grows them every year. Sows them in Spring and gives me them to plant in June. Have had a lovely display off most this year already and they are still covered in heads about to bloom .... maybe yours are bigger than mine maybe as you sow them so much earlier ?

 

I prefer spring planting to autumn, I always feel planting just before the winter doesn't always give plants enough time to get established.

 

Either spring or autumn, I don't think it matters. I am with you Sam. Traditionally spring is perhaps better as they can start to grow away immediately, whilst in autumn they are approaching winter, as Will Ting says.

But if you are using plants grown in a decent sized pot, then I think it can be done at almost any time in the year, as you aren't disturbing the roots - even now if you water them well. But if you are lifting and replanting then you damage the roots and its unfair in hot weather.

As far as flowering is concerned, plants have to be of a certain size and age to be able to flower. They are like people, they can only reproduce when they have reached sexual maturity. And there is not much you can do to speed up that process. For some trees it can take 40 to 60 years. But as long as seeds are sown at the right time, and the resultant plants are in a big enough pot, they will reach maturity at the same time as a plant in the border. In fact plants in pots often flower earlier as pots can warm up faster in spring than the soil in the border itself.

I sow all my bi-ennials in spring to be planted out in autumn and flower the next year. Its normally so cold up here that they make no attempt to flower this year. But I have just noticed my wallflowers are trying to flower 9 months too early. :D

Kristen, if I am planting up an area I like to put a small, often blank, label by each (or even a cane) just to make the position.

 

I like the idea of autumn planting - maybe I'm wrong but I feel the soil is warmed after summer, whereas it takes a long time to do the same in spring. I lost a couple of things planted last autumn but 90% survived.

 

buy them and plant them

 

My earlier reply should be considered in terms of moving plants within the garden.

I agree for container grown you can plant them at any time, getting them in in, or before early Spring gives time for them to establish before the drought arrives! and they will need less molly-coddling

 

So - and I ask this as a wet-behind-the ears novice - if I'm buying a bunch of flower seeds and young plants for the back garden - am i doing the completely wrong thing by planting them out in my newly created beds at this stage?

they are: plants -
bergenia
cranesbill
cyclamen

seeds -
poached egg flowers
harebells
forget-me-nots
cornflowers
as well as mixed lawn flower seeds going in with the grass seed

 

Depends how small the plants are to begin with - if plugs, pot them up into bigger pots until they're big enough to survive pests. I plant larger plants directly into the border.

Some seeds can be sown directly, but it's easier to keep an eye on them in pots.

 

I've already transplanted a few herbs from pots into the beds: borage, lemon balm, chives, thyme and bergamot. a couple of weeks in and they all seem to be doing okay. safe to leave them be? i planted some lobelia out too just to get a bit of colour in there as soon as possible. they were flowering nicely but have taken a right old pumelling today in the post-heatwave storms that hit glasgow this afternoon.