Garden Guy: Don't stress! Monoculture can really be a good option when it comes to containers

The Garden Guy sees a lot of needless garden stress when it comes to choosing plant partners for your containers. After watching the excitement Andrea Owens Schnapp created with a shared photo on my Facebook page, the answer to this stress may just be to go "mono y mono" ― not hand to hand, but monochrome.

Obviously, I am taking a gardener's approach, but Andrea taught us all a couple of lessons. First off, many of us had never heard of the plant she shared. I, for one, am supposed to know these things. She shared with me one of her favorite petunias, Supertunia Raspberry Rush. Wow, where did this one come from?

The fact that this photo has reached well over 50,000 on my Facebook page should be a megaphone-shout to both greenhouse growers and retailers alike. This is one beautiful petunia that many of us have not had the opportunity to buy or, in their case, make that cash register jingle.

One is also a key word, as this was the only plant in a dazzling turquoise glazed container. Supertunia Raspberry Rush has won Top Performer Awards all over the place, which makes it hard to understand why so many of us haven’t had the opportunity to buy it.

It reaches about 12-inches tall with a 24-inch spread. As one gets the feeling looking at Andrea’s photo from Florida, it has the potential of growing even more.

The comments from my Facebook Page followers showed a love for both the Supertunia and the colorful container. So, one way to look at this is that the container itself served as a colorful companion. The container was also large enough to allow the Supertunia to be all it could be.

The Garden Guy: National Garden Bureau declares 2024 the 'Year of the Angelonia,' the summer snapdragon

More Garden Guy: Plant a blaze of color throughout your garden with award-winning coleus

As drop dead gorgeous as this was, Andrea hit it out of the park with another glazed container of similar color but different textural pattern. In this container, monoculture again, was the new Supertunia Persimmon. There is just something about the orange and yellow blossoms up against turquoise.

Though Supertunia Persimmon is still considered new, it has won a lot of Top Performer Awards and Perfect Score in University of Tennessee trials. Both pictures make you wonder how another plant would have even contributed to the containers. Monoculture can really be a good option when it comes to containers.

Andrea, who is a trained horticulturist and now serves as a Master Gardener, chose to group several containers together on her patio. Though each container has only one plant, the cluster looks like a garden when grouped together.

The Garden Guy has a lot of containers to maintain and to reach the look that Andrea has, especially in Florida, takes frequent watering and feeding. In Georgia where I garden, I use the best potting soil I can get my hands on, water daily and feed with a water-soluble mix every 2 to 3 weeks. It is like a liquid blue jug brigade.

I’ve got quite a few of last year’s Supertunias, Superbells and Superbenas about ready to bloom. This year’s plant orders will arrive sometime in April. But these early Supers in bloom will be happening because I cut back last August and trimmed a little coming out of this winter. I want to give a shout out to Andrea Owens Schnapp in Florida for reminding us not only of the varieties out there, but that monoculture can be a beautiful style.

Follow Norman Winter on Facebook @NormanWinterTheGardenGuy for more photos and garden inspiration. See more columns by Norman at SavannahNow.com/lifestyle/home-garden/.

This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: Monoculture is a good option when it comes to container gardens