Autumn has arrived! The cool rains, winds, and cloudy skies remind me just how much I really love autumn! With each changing year, I become more and more aware of the beauty that surrounds me. I see sunsets, leaf color, and fall decorations with a new and enlightened heart each time. And so it seems, each year I get more creative with my choices for fall pots. Most of my coworkers know that I like to use different plants in my customers’ annual beds each year; well, pots are no different.
Last year, I used pumpkins, bittersweet berries, hedge balls, grasses, pine needles, and hawthorn berries for my creations. I enjoy going to the pumpkin patch and looking over an endless array of orange, white, and bluish colors for just the right sized and shaped pumpkin for each pot. I know instantly when I see it that it will work. I have learned where the best bittersweet berries grow in Brown County, and where to find the biggest hedge balls.
With each new season comes the desire to get more elaborate with my creations. I really miss design work and tend to get my art on in my maintenance work. This year, I added pine cones, gourds, and sedums to my fall pots. By using an array of perennials and grasses to beds and pots, I get longer lasting color than mums and pumpkins can provide.
When deciding to plant your own annual fall pots, be sure to use things you like. I like to find natural items around a property and use them if possible. Pine needles and cones can be used for filler and mulch. Pumpkins, gourds, and squash remind us of the harvest and give us a true feeling of autumn. Field corn and hedge balls fill the gaps between large pumpkins. Mums, flowering kale, sedums, native grasses, and sedges provide a living backdrop to the things we are used to seeing in the fall. Bittersweet berries, hawthorn berries, seedpods, and dried flowers can also add color and interest.
I also added burlap this year to the pots for an added rustic feel. You can create using natural elements, twine, rope, farm implements, metal washtubs; anything farm related can bring that sense of harvest into your fall creations.
If you add live plants, do not forget to water!
Happy hunting!
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