Plants for a Patio Planter

Colorful foliage and flowers make a lovely patio planter.

A patio planter can bring color and life to an apartment balcony or help soften the transition between the home and landscape on the deck of a house. A planter also brings flowers, foliage and fruit up close so that viewers can admire the fine lines on a pansy face, inhale the tang of citrus fruit or floral perfume, and watch as container-grown vegetables ripen before their eyes.

Flowers and Foliage

Flowers and foliage bring scent and color to the patio planter. Sweet potato vines and coleus provide a wide range of leaf shades, while geraniums, impatiens and begonias are classic container plants that flower all season long. Less common container specimens can bring a lovely perfume to the patio. The University of Kentucky Cooperative Extension suggests the everblooming gardenia, with its waxy white flowers, glossy foliage and delicate scent. Lily of the valley provides a distinctive perfume in late spring and grows well in containers, while it may become overly invasive in the landscape. Mints and other culinary herbs also provide rich scents when brushed against on the patio.

Fruit

The Texas A&M University Extension suggests that the best way to ensure that home citrus plants don't freeze is to grow them in patio containers and move them indoors during colder weather. While Texas A&M recommends the satsuma orange (Citrus unshiu) as the most cold-hardy citrus plant well-suited to patio planter growing, other options include the dwarf meyer lemon, dwarf pomegranates, and columnar apple varieties. Many strawberry varieties also grow well in patio planters, draping over the sides of the container and providing green foliage, bright white flowers and tasty red fruit. Strawberries can be grown in the same container as dwarf fruit trees or container varieties of blueberry bushes for handy and healthy patio snacks.

Vegetables

A vegetable garden in miniature can be grown in patio containers in any sunny location. The West Virginia University Extension notes that container vegetable gardening is handy if you don't have space for a full-sized garden, but are also attractive. Lettuce, miniature cherry tomato varieties, small growing green peppers and radishes create a salad garden in a single large pot. Swiss chard and kale can withstand partial shade, and provide beautiful greens to offset edible flowers such as pansy and nasturtium. Bush varieties of winter squash have lovely blossoms which attract butterflies and hummingbirds, and grow beautifully in half-whiskey-barrel sized planters.

References

• West Virginia University Extension Service: Container Gardening
• Texas A&M Extension: Growing Citrus in Patio Containers
• University of Kentucky Cooperative Extension: Flowering Plants for Home and Office