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A Close-Up Look at Flowering Plants
On This Page
Here, you’ll find discussions of the following subjects beneath each of the following titles:
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- Looking Closely at Flowers
- Parts of a Flower
- Why Knowing Flowers’ Needs is Important
- About Annual Flowers
- About Biennial, Perennial and Bulbous-Rooted Flowers
Looking Closely at Flowers
Become inspired with this quick introduction to the enjoyable world of flowering annual, biennial, perennial, and bulb plants for home landscapes.
We’ll show you some examples of beautiful flower plantings you can grow in your yard [see: Flowers in Home Landscapes]. You’ll also find some useful and facts about the many different kinds of plants we call loosely call flowers [see: Flower Facts and Bulb Basics].
Annual flowers grow from seed, flower, and, when pollinated, develop new seed for the following year.
Biennial flowering plants have two-year life cycles: a first to develop foliage and mature roots, and a second to set their flowers and mature seed. Perennials, to compare, are long-lasting plants, living from year to year.
Bulbs are a special class of perennials that have specialized roots to permit them to survive harsh conditions of heat, drought, and cold.
Flowering plants are amazing in their complexity. Along with the monocotyledons, the flowering plants, or dicotyledons, are one of the two main botanical branches in the world of green plants.
Literally and figuratively, there’s no end to the total number of flowering plants. Every year, tens if not hundreds of thousands of entirely new varieties, hybrids, and cultivars of flowers appear as if by magic. They are the genetic result of random cross-hybridizations, mutations, and intentional breeding [see: Propagating Flowers and Bulbs].
A speck of pollen from the male stamen or anther of one parent plant finds its way to the ripe female pistil of another plant’s flower and fertilizes it.
The pollen speck might be carried by the wind, by a pollinating insect, or by the careful and intentional action of a botanical hybridizer seeking a new and improved version of the two plants. Seed forms, and entirely new plants grow.
Parts of a Flower
Here are some key parts you’ll find on most flowering plants—in this case, a zinnia with complete and compound, not simple, flowers.
Why Knowing Flowers’ Needs is Important
As a child, you probably called all annuals, biennials, and perennials “flowers.” Most of us did. We lumped together quite a few ornamental trees and shrubs, the true flowers, and many bulbs.
While this practical childhood view might jar botanists, it neatly describes the biological destiny of flowers. Their beauty exists to reproduce.
Annuals bloom with lightning speed and keep going for up to five months. They have to get their job done fast, because they’ll fade and die soon.
The next generation of annuals depends on them being successful, and their many-flowered, long bloom ensures their survival. More permanent plants—including perennials and bulbs—often flower for shorter lengths of time than the annuals.
About Annual Flowers
As their name implies, annuals complete their entire life cycle in a single year or less, sometimes only in a few weeks. Their short lives end with their death in autumn or early winter. That’s also why you must replant annuals from seed or transplants every year.
Practically speaking, a flowering annual is any plant that you intend to keep in your garden for a year or less. That broad goal includes both true annuals and a selection of other flowering plants.
Annuals are divided further into three major categories, according to how well they tolerate freezing temperatures: They are Hardy (able to survive repeated hard frosts), Half-hardy (able to survive light frost), or Tender (killed by frost).
As you might expect, most tropical annuals and warm-season annuals are frost tender while most cool-season annuals suffer in excessive heat.
Warm-season annuals prefer the warm soil and air temperatures that characterize summer in most of North America. In many regions, cool-season annuals fade or even die when the intense heat of mid-summer begins. They must be planted very early in spring, but in some regions, these can be replanted in autumn after summer heat ends.
Hardy specimens are so frost tolerant that they even may be planted in autumn to winter over and provide flowers the following spring, as do spring-blooming bulbs.
A few cool-season selections, though, are fussy. They’re intolerant of both frost and heat. Plant them only in areas that enjoy year-round mild growing conditions or treat them as annuals in your region.
About Biennial, Perennial and Bulbous-Rooted Flowers
If you plan to grow biennials and perennials as annuals in your home landscape garden, start them indoors, purchase them as second-season transplants, or find quick-blooming cultivars and sow them early.
Some perennials and bulbs also are tender. They have tuberous roots, stolons, or rhizomes that die in cold weather. Use them as annuals if you live in a cold-winter area. Just replant them each year or dig up their roots and bring them inside for replanting the following season [see: Thinning, Lifting, and Dividing].
Why is it important to know such botanical details?
Simply put, this knowledge helps prevent you from experiencing the number one cause of annual-garden failure: Too many gardeners make the mistake of planting the right annual, biennial, or tender perennial at the wrong time.
The good news is, regardless of where you live, you can grow most any kind of annual, so long as you plan around your growing season and climate [see Plant Hardiness and Climate].
After you’ve determined the length of your growing season, you’ll need to know something about the prevailing temperatures in your region.
When your only goal is to grow a few pots of Johnny-Jump-Ups, it makes little difference whether you’re in Portland, Maine; Winnipeg, Canada; or Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. The challenge begins when you instead choose unusual plants or those with very specific needs.
Just because Portland, Oregon, and Charleston, South Carolina, both have long growing seasons, for instance, it doesn’t mean both cities will have the same annual flowers in their gardens at the same time. The trick is to match the type of annual you’re planting with the time of year it will thrive in your area.
You’ll find you’re able to keep most of the flowers—annuals, biennials, perennials, or bulbs—you want to grow on your planting list, once you know your climate and are realistic about how much growing time you and nature are able to give them, and when they will bloom in your area.