Fuchsia
The colorful magenta, white, and pink blossoms of fuchsias brighten any shaded spot. Even where it can be grown only as a summer annual or a house or greenhouse plant, the common fuchsia is popular. Upright varieties reach various heights, to 10 feet, and lend themselves to use as specimens, components of shrub borders, or espaliers. Others, diminutive and trailing, are best grown in hanging planters or in raised beds.
Some are pruned to a single vertical stem to form graceful standards. The flowers appear profusely from spring to winter in the mildest areas. They are pendulous on thin stems, usually 2 to 6 inches long, and often bicolored. The upper, waxy, backward-flaring part of the blossom (the sepals) is white or some shade of red or pink. The petals (forming the corolla) may match the sepals or be white or almost any conceivable shade .of violet, purple, blue-violet, rose, pink, orange, or red. The pistil and sometimes the stamens often extend well beyond the corolla. Some corollas are tight and simple, others extravagantly ruffled and elaborate. Whatever the flowers’ forms and colors, hummingbirds love them.
The leaves are thin, smooth, finely toothed, and oval or oblong, dark green above, with light green undersides. They measure from 1 to 6 inches long and at least an inch wide.
Fuchsias are native to western South America and prefer dense to light shade. Most are hardy only in Zones 9 and 10. Plant fuchsias in the spring in well-drained soil that is high in organic matter. They are very sensitive to drought, so water regularly to keep the soil moist. Fuchsias are heavy feeders; fertilize with a complete fertilizer every two weeks.
To encourage continuous blossoms, remove fading blooms, and pinch the stem tips to prevent plants from becoming leggy. Each spring, prune fuchsias back to the edge of their container, or two-thirds of the way back to the ground. Fuchsias grow fast and bloom only on new wood.
Many fuchsia species are cultivated, but the following two are particularly valuable in the shade garden. F. magellanica (Magellan Fuchsia), native to Chile and Argentina, is used as a specimen, or as a hedge in the more temperate parts of Britain and North America. A vigorous grower, it can reach 20 feet trained
on walls, but is seen more often as a shrub of 3 to 8 feet. In northern areas it is treated as a perennial. Flowers are small (1 1/2 inch) but very profuse. Sepals are bright red and the corolla is blue. It blooms best in light to medium shade but will hold its own, in looser fashion, in deep shade. This is one of the hardiest fuchsias (to Zone 6), and one of the least finicky.
F. procumbens from the North Island of New Zealand, is a prostrate ground cover whose many-branched, aggressively spreading stems root freely Its small blossoms are yellow, brownish red, and green, with blue pollen. The pink fruits, 3/4-inch long, are showy. It prefers moist rich soil in medium shade, and is hardy only in Zone 10,
