A beautiful garden with KinderGarden plants

Creating a beautiful garden with KinderGarden plants is easy but you need to start early!

Wouldn’t it be great to produce a garden just like this?

Well although this is a demonstration garden using KinderGarden plants it is perfectly achievable!

This garden was created by using KinderGarden plants and these are plants that are widely available in garden centres now.

With a little bit of care and attention – and a lot of fun – this could be your garden!

 

 

 

Why grow them?

These early season starter plants are easy enough to grow.

They can save you a lot of money when compared to buying the normal sized bedding plant in late spring.

KinderGarden plants are not the only brand of starter plants in the market. Nevertheless they were the first to develop this concept of taking away the uncertainty of raising your own plants from seed or from cuttings.

These baby plants bridge the gap between growing bedding plants from seed packets and buying ready to plant out trays of bedding plants in late spring.

Now you don’t need to have a greenhouse or conservatory to grow these little babies. However there is little doubt that it helps.

A well lit windowsill to start them off will do.

If you have a conservatory, so much the better!

What to do with them when you get home

Taking your starter plants home, you can then transplant them at your leisure into cell trays- often called modules.

Or for bigger starter plants you should transplant them into 9 cm pots but in both cases make sure that you use good quality fresh potting compost.

 

Watering

After an initial watering you should make certain that your plants never dry out.

Equally it’s important that they don’t become too wet!

Here is where your finger comes in! Gently push your finger into the compost to check whether the compost is moist down where the plant roots are!

Giving the right amount of water is becoming increasingly important. I find that peat free composts need a different approach to those containing peat.

 

Pinching

Don’t be afraid to pinch the tops out of your plants!

If they become tall and straggly that’s often because they aren’t getting enough light.

But “pinching” will encourage them to branch out. This will ultimately produce a better show for you in summer and you’ll achieve that beautiful garden with KinderGarden plants.

 

Keep them growing

After four to six weeks it will be necessary to add liquid feed to the water that you give your little babies. Do check what is recommended on the compost bag as some composts have more feed than others.

Phostrogen Plant Food or Miracle Gro All Purpose is perfect for this.

 

Hardening them off

Once established and filling the compost with roots, you can move them to a sheltered area outside. Put them outside the back door where you can keep a close eye on them.

Ensure that they don’t dry out and you can easily cover them when the weatherman warns of frost.

Here they get acclimatised (or ‘hardened off ’) to life outside. It’s important to do this before you fill your pots, baskets, window-boxes and borders with these summer flowering plants.

 

Plug Plants from Cuttings

Of course KinderGarden plants, and others, are available as rooted cuttings in tiny pots and plant plugs.

There are all the favourite varieties such as Surfinia Petunia, trailing Fuchsia and Pelargonium, begonias and lots more to choose from.

 

Plug Plants from Seed

The range with seedling grown plug plants is perhaps limited.

However it includes all the favourites. You’ll find busy lizzies (Impatiens), fibrous rooted begonias, Lobelia and geraniums (Pelargonium).

These are the ones that are best grown on in modular trays.

 

 

 

I also wrote about plug plants a year ago and you might like to read that here.

Of course, you could wait till May and buy bedding plants ready to go straight out. But growing on your own baby starter plants now is not only easy and great fun but will also save your pocket too!

 

STOP PRESS!

I’ve just been given a pack of the latest busy lizzies called Impatiens ‘Beacon’. I’m delighted to grow these this year. I want to see whether they truly have the downy mildew resistance claimed!

They certainly look much more like the very best Impatiens ‘Accent Series’ that used to be the number one bedding plant worldwide a few years ago. Sadly, this was decimated by downy mildew and it’s been a few years since we have been able to grow this great versatile summer bedding plant.