The Garden Doctor: Undercover fences

[Times photos: Lara Cerri] Red passion flower provides an exotic drape over a wrought-iron fence at St. Thomas Episcopal Church in St. Petersburg.

By JOHN A. STARNES Jr.
© St. Petersburg Times
published February 23, 2002

Turn that utilitarian barrier into an eye-catching trellis running riot with color and fragrance, courtesy of rapidly growing, hardy flowering vines.

Even the most beautiful home can look dumpy if it is surrounded by an ugly chain-link fence. Even new, they aren't attractive; bent, rusty fences are unsightly. Wrought-iron fences and those of other materials can benefit from decorative plantings. If you don't have a few thousand bucks for a classy decorative fence, try seeing yours in a whole new light, as a sturdy, hurricane-proof trellis just begging to be covered with inviting color, lushness and even fragrance.

Our subtropical climate allows us to grow many beautiful, inexpensive flowering vines that will bounce back after rare hard freezes, and, once they are established, defy droughts. For far less than $100 at garden shops and mail-order suppliers, you can space some lovely varieties all along that fence, limited only by your imagination and color preferences. Watch them transform it into a cherished focal point of your property.

Plant deeply, mulch thickly, and water weekly until the plants are established. Feed them four times a year with a balanced complete fertilizer such as fish meal or fish emulsion; they'll leap into growth when summer rains arrive.

For fiery orange, try flame vine (Pyrostegia ignea), Mexican flame vine (Senecio confusus), cape honeysuckle (Tecomaria capensis), black-eyed Susan vine (Thunbergia sp.) or some of the hybrid bougainvilleas.

Allamanda (Allamanda cathartica), Brazilian Gold Vine (Stigmaphyllon ciliatum), yellow jasmine (Jasminum humile "Revolutum") and Carolina jasmine (Gelsemium sempervirens) offer bright yellows. An alluring contrast to the yellows is easily achieved with the luxuriant blue skyflower (Thunbergia grandiflora). A packet of good old-fashioned Heavenly Blue morning glory will swath a whole section of fence for about $1 in those wonderful blooms we remember from our grandmothers' gardens. Purple Haze passion flower (Passiflora hybrid) is a lovely, rich blue. Finally, and bluest of all, Blue Dawn flower (Ipomea acuminata) is a perennial morning glory that resembles a much deeper version of Heavenly Blue, an annual.

Red passion flower blooms

Bright reds bring pizazz to any landscape. Red passion flower (Passiflora coccinea) is mind-boggling in both its rampant vigor and intensity of color in the ornate blossoms.

For pinks, let your fence be entwined by the lovely likes of the various mandevilla and bougainvillea hybrids or the ultra-vigorous coral vine (Antigonon leptopus).

Imagine your whole yard perfumed by exotic flowering vines, each flowering at a different time of year. All of these possess fragrances that carry on the air and into your open windows: Madagascar jasmine (Stephanotis floribunda), Confederate jasmine (Trachelospermum jasminoides), corkscrew flower (Vigna Caracalla) and the night-blooming moon vine (Ipomea Alba), an annual, have white blossoms. Chinese violet (Telosoma cordata) is lemon yellow. The passion flower hybrids Incense and Nephrodes are deep purple and rose pink, respectively. Plant any or all of these for an "incense fence."

Speaking of fragrance, several old varieties of climbing and rambling roses are as easy to grow as any vine if you choose "own-root" types rather than grafted.

In my south Tampa yard and my clients' yards where no sprays are ever used (only quarterly organic soil feedings), rampant growth and beautiful scented blooms are borne freely by aggressive climbers such as Francois Juranville (salmon buff), Prosperity (snow white), Cl. Cramoisi superieur (cherry red), Crepuscule (apricot yellow), Mme. Alfred Carriere (softest pink) and Mermaid (buttery yellow).

If you like bizarre plants, indulge in the alien-looking surrealistic blooms of the various species of Aristolochia, like A. gigantea Brasiliensis, with its 10-inch diameter pouch-like blossoms, each intricately mottled maroon-brown, looking like a Dutchman's Pipe on steroids and hallucinogens. Surely, if there are flowers on other planets they look like this.

SOURCES:

• Logee's Greenhouses: Toll-free, 1-888-330-8038; www.logees.com
• Stokes Tropicals: Toll-free, 1-800-624-9706; info@stokestropicals.com
• Many local garden shops.

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