Flower Boxes
for Every Season

Welcome Springtime
Spring can’t officially arrive until window boxes are spilling out with violas and pansies. Many colors of pansies are available, and you’ll have a wonderful time mixing and combining the tiny violet-colored johnny-jump-ups with larger, flowering, colorful hybrids. When the weather gets hot, the plants can become leggy and should be replaced with summer plants. A springtime display is cheerful, although fleeting. Primroses, narcissus and tulips are fragrant, but only bloom a few weeks. In the early spring, window boxes planted with bulbs, pansies, violas, English daisies, forget-me-nots and wallflowers can brighten any day. A planting of just tulips, daffodils or hyacinths is a study in simplicity. When you buy the flowering bulbs in pots, just slip the pots into the planting box. Cover them with Spanish moss or sheets of dampened peat moss to add a new depth. When the bulbs are done blooming, transplant them to your garden to finish their growth cycle. Sprigs of pussy willow and forsythia or small plants of flowering almond rhododendron will add additional vertical design.

Lazy Days of Summer
When it is TGIFF—“Thank goodness it’s frost-free”—and the lazy, hazy days of summer arrive, plant annuals, perennials, houseplants and colorful tropical-foliage plants in the box. They will flower and grow all summer long. Even small varieties of sunflowers, like sunspot and teddy bear, can be added. Herbs are a wonderful addition and can be harvested for cooking and crafts. Coleus with streamers of vinca and sweet-potato vine add cascading accents. White birch branches are a nice touch. Some of my favorite combinations for a sunny exposure are geraniums, petunias, lobelia and variegated vinca. Verbena, ageratum, sweet alyssum, geraniums and grape ivy make an exciting statement.

For shadier spots, use fuchsia, impatiens and coleus. Other eye-pleasers include begonias, torenia, tuberous begonias and trailing alchemies.

Although flowers are traditional, vegetables and fruits provide a distinctive touch. Strawberry runners are particularly attractive spilling over the front of a box. Ornamental strawberries are now available with pink flowers and variegated foliage. Chives, cherry tomatoes, lettuce, spinach, green onions, rainbow chard and peppers are pleasing to behold as well as delicious. Attracting hummingbirds, beneficial insects and butterflies is another reason to start a window box. Beneficial insects, like lace wings and ladybug beetles, eat aphids; hummingbirds and butterflies sip nectar and pollinate the flowers. Plant a window box with verbena and petunias and watch the “hummers” and “flutter-bys” flock to those boxes.

Autumn Breeze
By fall your window box will have reached its peak of beauty or be a wreck. It’s important to keep an eye on weather reports in anticipation of chilly nights. Prolong the display by draping the box with a sheet or newspaper when frost is predicted. Replace tired flowers with hardy mums or flowering kale, leaving the plants in their original pots. Champagne-colored mums carry on long after frost, lengthening the seasonal show. Asters, ornamental grasses and mini-roses add color and interest. Sprigs of bittersweet offer a vertical lift. As fall changes, include branches of colorful leaves, grapevines, small pumpkins, winter squash or gourds for texture and seasonal color. Indian corn or some corn stalks are wonderful fall accents. Corkscrew willow and branches laden with berries will bring excitement, as will fruit like viburnum and crab apples. Fruits, like apples, oranges, pineapples and artichokes, can be wired in to add more festivity to the holidays. Little extras, like scarecrows, big hairy spiders, plastic fake bones or plump turkeys, will delight passers-by.

Winter Warm-up
Before the snow glistens and the fireplace is ablaze, clean out the box, including the soil. When frozen, water in the soil expands and may crack or warp the box. Fill with shredded bark and add a bright red bow and evergreen branches, like pine, fir, holly, spruce or boxwood. Place a small open-tray feeder (protected from the wind and water) on top of the window box and keep it filled with seeds or suet for the birds. Wild Birds Unlimited (1775 N. Highland Road, Bethel Park, 412/833-9299; 3848 William Penn Highway, Monroeville, 412/374-0678; 10900 Perry Highway, Route 19, Wexford, 724/935-0051) and feed stores carry feeders and seeds, along with charts for identifying birds that visit. Large evergreen cones from a craft store can be wired to the evergreen branches. Catan’s Craft Centers (1250 Chartiers Ave., McKees Rocks, 412/771-0606; Kennywood Plaza, 431 Hoffman Blvd., Duquesne, 412/466-7990; 296 Curry Hollow Road, Pleasant Hills, 412/653-8666) have some unusual cones from the western species of evergreen trees when in season. Take advantage of berry-covered branches from the woods or your backyard. Dried weeds, like tessel and Queen Anne’s lace, can be painted or left natural. Bare stems from trees and shrubs may be sprayed red, or use cut branches of red-twig or yellow-twig dogwood for color. Consider mini-lights to brighten up the wintery nights. Small evergreen plants can be added: heaths, heathers, deciduous holly, evergreen holly, small boxwood or Alberta spruce. Leave them in their pots in the window box. Use shredded bark to cover the pots. And remember: Have fun and let window boxes lift you to new heights of gardening.

<previous