A Short Guide on Flowering Trees and Shrubs
Gardens are wonderful spaces. They give you the chance to get outside, enjoy some fresh air, relax and spend time with your family. The changing of the seasons means that there is always a new and fresh view to enjoy.
This is especially the case if you plant a few flowering trees and shrubs in your garden. Doing so is not hard. The following post is a short guide for inspiration but if you click here, you’ll be taken to an online retailer that sells 70 varieties of flowering trees!
That’s a lot of choice – so I’ve gone through them and picked out a handful that are relatively easy to grow and maintain. Hopefully, this will help you to narrow down your options.
Ann Magnolias
If you are lucky enough to have the right growing conditions, you really can’t go wrong with magnolias. For some reason, these trees have gotten a reputation for being difficult to grow. When, in fact, the opposite is true. Once you have got them established they take virtually no effort to look after.
Of all of the varieties, the one to go for is the Ann Magnolia, which was developed in the 1950s by the U.S. National Arboretum. If conditions are right you will get to enjoy a riot of colour twice per year. Typically, they grow to a height of about 10 feet and have a spread of around 8 feet, which makes them the perfect choice for most urban gardens.
Flowering Dogwood
If you are looking for a tree that provides colour and interest almost year round, the dogwood is a fantastic choice. It’s easy to find pink, white and red varieties. In the spring every inch of the branches are covered in wonderful flowers. Once they are gone the green leaves come through. Later in the year, when the weather starts to get cooler, they turn a reddish-purple. Even the bare branches look striking. Understandably, this is an extremely popular flowering tree.
Flowering Fruit Trees
All fruit trees produce blossom, which is one of the reasons so many of us choose to plant them in our gardens. But, some produce far more than others.
Flowering cherry trees tend to produce the most spectacular display, but there are now varieties of pear and apple trees that are getting close to matching them for colour and impact. Sadly, the ones that produce the most spectacular floral displays do not go on to produce any edible fruit.
Red Buckeye
The red buckeye is a variety of tree that originated in North America and is now becoming more widely available in other parts of the world. It’s large deep red flowers attract butterflies and if you live in North or South America you’ll know that they attract hummingbirds too!
Looking after your Flowering Trees
When deciding which trees to plant, you need to think about the work involved in looking after them. The best nurseries will tell you how to take care of the trees you buy from them.
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Written by Mark Williams. Mark is a gardening enthusiast who enjoys writing and sharing valuable tips he has learnt along the way. When Mark isn’t working on his allotment, you can find him spending time with his nephews at the park, playing ice hockey or cooking up a storm in the kitchen.
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