Easy to Grow Geraniums Improve Any Garden

More and more homeowners are realizing that a well kept garden can vastly improve their home (and it’s value). Even those houses with a small backyard can benefit greatly by the addition of a few plants, maybe grown in containers. While many can afford to employ the services of a landscaping contractor to create a suitable garden design and then construct and maintain it, most of us can not afford the luxury. Luckily gardening is not really that difficult and there are many garden perennials, such as geraniums, which are not only beautiful but are relatively easy to grow.

Perennials are those plants which grow and flower year after year whereas ‘annuals’ flower and die in the one year. The advantage to growing perennials, such as geraniums, is simply the fact that they create far less work than many other garden plants. You plant your perennials and, besides weeding and general garden duties, you can sit back and enjoy the blooms year after year. Furthermore, by choosing your landscaping plants carefully you can create borders in which the plants grow into each other creating a wall of color and few weeds, a low maintenance garden design!

Geraniums were first introduced, from Africa, into Europe in the sixteenth century. Due to their wide ranging colors of whites, pinks and blues which include mauve and deeper blues to almost black, geraniums soon became popular with gardeners. The popularity of geraniums was further enhance by the fact that they are incredibly easy to grow successfully.

As well as the wonderful range of colors, the blooms of the geranium are sometimes veined with a darker color creating more interest. Furthermore the leaves of the plant can range from mid-green to dark-green and can be gray-green or even silver-green. Altogether these variations help make the choice of geraniums wide and interesting. Overall there are well over 400 different species of geranum, below are some of the most popular.

Popular Geraniums

G. cinereum which grows up to 15cm (6in) high and 30cm (1ft) across.

G. dalmaticum which grows up to 15cm (6in) high and 60cm (2ft) across.

G. endressii which grows up to 45cm (1.5ft) high.

G. grandiflorum which grows up to 30cm (1ft) high and 60cm (2ft) across.

G. ibericum which grows up to 60cm (2ft) high and 60cm (2ft) across.

G. macrorrhizum which grows up to 30cm (1ft) high and 60cm (2ft) across.

G. phaeum which grows up to 60cm (2ft) high and 45cm (1.5ft) across.

G. pratense which grows up to, or even over, 60cm (2ft) high.

G. psilostemon which grows up to 90cm (3ft) high and 75cm (2.5ft) across.

G. renardii which grows up to 23cm (9in) high and 60cm (2ft) across.

G. sanguineum which grows up to 25cm (10in) high and 45cm (1.5ft) across.

G. subcaulescens which grows up to 15cm (6in) high and 30cm (1ft) across.

G. sylvaticum which grows up to 75cm (2.5ft) high and 60cm (2ft) across.

G. wallichianum which grows up to 30cm (1ft) high and 60cm (2ft) across.

As you can see there is a wide choice. If you want to grow this incredibly useful garden perennial there is plenty of information available on the Internet and there are many good quality gardening books available online, from your nearest book shop or from local libraries.