Bedding Plants

Bedding plants – more information

Bedding plants are cheap and cheerful! Think riotous colour to fill your beds and borders from spring into the beginning of autumn. Popular annual bedding includes traditional begonia semperflorens with their delicate, neat flowers and the classic bright red tender geraniums which, planted fresh every year, reinvigorate the garden at the close of a long winter. Did you know that bedding can be long term too? With some fantastic perennial bedding and foliage bedding available at Thompson & Morgan it’s time to get creative.

When to plant bedding plants

Bedding plants generally become available to plant around early spring. Most annual bedding plants are tender which means that they still need protecting against the frost and cold. Keep tender pelargoniums and begonias under cover until the temperatures rise in May.

Do bedding plants grow back each year?

For a low maintenance, long lived bedding display choose perennial bedding. Hardy geraniums, fuchsias, heuchera and alstroemeria tolerate winter cold very well, returning every spring with fresh growth followed by glorious, colourful flowers.

Tuberous begonias and tender geraniums are commonly treated as annuals but will be perennial if protected from winter frost. Grow these lovely bedding plants in pots to make moving them into winter storage super easy. All they need is to be placed in an unheated greenhouse or garage until temperatures warm again in spring.

Annual bedding like petunias and busy lizzies give the best display if bought fresh every year. Pop these beauties into gaps in the border or fill window boxes and hanging baskets for an instant colour lift. Annual bedding needs replacing every year.

What is a bedding plant?

A bedding plant is simply a plant that makes a great display! Bedding plants are versatile and always colourful, sometimes in foliage and often with showy, long-flowering blooms. Bedding plants are often used to inject quick colour into a bare space.

Traditionally, bedding plants decorate public parks and displays, although they’ve come back into vogue to be used as anything from gap fillers, wall hangings and all kinds of container displays at home too. Here at Thompson & Morgan we stock annual, foliage and perennial bedding to help you make the most of your outside space.