GROWING STANDARDS and PILLARS
Once established, standards are easy to maintain. The standard below is old and gnarled. It was moved 18 months ago after growing in my Mother's garden for 12 years. It was cut back severely when moved and it looked dead for 4 months. I was just deciding whether to discard it when one morning my neighbour came and excitedly exclaimed that it had several shoots.
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By the end of November it was as lush as ever, now it has survived several days of 40 degree heat with little damage. In between the only thing necessary was an occasion trim due to weather conditions or the fact the "head" was just too heavy. Even dead-heading seems unnecessary - nothing seems to stop Pixie flowering. This medium single flowering fuchsia is one of my favourites - a must for any garden.. You too can have standards if you follow a few easy steps.
There is a lot of work in the first 18 months, this is my method: Coming Soon
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Two 6ft high pillars in the sun except for late
afternoon.
A 7' high standard of Ambassador.
2 Standards still at the whip stage, behind them one section of a Gartenmeister Bonstedt hedge that is all along the verandah. In the middle Chang. |
3 partly trained standards - unfortunately I couldn't resist letting them flower. I always put in the stake I am going to finish with at the beginning, so I don't have the hassle of replacing stakes. When I have tried the replacement method in the past I have snapped all or part of the plant off. A friend says that the fuchsias get an inferiority complex when as a 3" plant they are given a 6' stake but as you see they still try to get to the top.
What you shouldn't do: Checkerboard standard put on a spurt of growth due to hot wet weather. I couldn't bear to cut off the dozens of buds, I now have trimmed it back so it will be more compact in a few weeks.
Small standard of ?? with tiny flowers I really like these small singles as they flower most profusely. |
