Every well-balanced pot needs a: THRILLER, a few FILLERS, and a few SPILLERS.

These are the main types of plants you must use to create one of those unbelievable pots you've all seen in the magazines. If you have never had luck with putting pots together, remember these three easy things, and you will be amazed with the looks you can create!

THRILLERS are the fabulous stars that stand up above the rest, usually in the center stage. Good examples of THRILLERS would be large dracaena spikes, purple fountain grass, dark-leaved cannas, and big, beautiful coleus. For a year-round container, an evergreen topiary would look great. These plants become the focal point of the pot, the main star of the show.

Next in our lineup are the FILLERS. These are the colorful characters that support the stars, the Thrillers. They are usually not as tall, but bushy and full of blooms that keep you entertained all summer long. Examples of FILLERS might be: pansies, petunias, African daisies, marigolds, agaranthyum, coleus, New Guinea impatiens, begonias, celosia, dianthus. FILLERS grow upright and give the container a lush, full, colorful look.

Last but not least are the SPILLERS that we have all grown to LOVE. They "spill" over the sides of the pot and get more and more magnificent as they lengthen. Some popular SPILLERS are: bacopa, supertunias, million bells, potato vine, lobelia, vinca vine, lamium, alyssum, creeping charlie, creeping jenny, as well as an assortment of spreading low-growing sedums. Plant these around the edge of the container so they can creep over and give you the look you want, as soon as possible.

Be sure to treat your plants like the stars that they are by using a high quality potting soil and fertilizing them regularly with "bloom food" to keep them blooming happily. Deadheading is also important. Since containers don't need weeding, you can spend that time wisely picking off the spent flowers to make the spectacular show continue, all summer long!

Daylilies, members of the Liliaceae (lily family), are some of the easiest to grow and most popular of the garden perennials. Because they have a range in size, color, and design application, there is a daylily for almost everyone and every garden. Like their name Hemerocallis, "beauty for a day," the individual daylily flower lasts only one day. What is so wonderful? They are borne on long arching stems with the flowers in clusters and bloom in succession over a period of two to six months from mid-spring to late, depending upon the variety.

Daylilies are versatile in the garden and landscape. They can be very dramatic in a perennial border or in the foreground of shrubbery plantings. They can be spectacular as foundation plantings, cover an unsightly bank or serve as accents beside a pond. These flowers are more dramatically effective when planted in clusters of three or more to create sweeping drifts or a mass effect. Not only do the flowers sway in the breeze, so does the light, strapping foliage. Motion in the garden!

The flower colors of the species come in vibrant shades of yellow, orange, and red, with a much more varied color selection in the hybrids. Plants have been developed with flowers in cream, gold, scarlet, pink, apricot, purple, violet, and plum. There are also hybrids, which repeatedly bloom throughout the summer; they bloom early, then after a short rest, bloom again, constantly repeating the process.

Don't miss out on our new daylily hybrids with ruffles, piecrust ruffles, and picotee borders. Ruffles have soft, lightly wavy edges. Piecrust edging has heavy indentations, much like edges to a pie crust. Picotee has petal margins that are either lighter or darker than the main petal color—a contrasting color. All of these new introductions are gorgeous!

Choose a sunny or lightly shaded location for your daylilies. The best flowers will be produced when they are planted in a sunny location, unless you live in a very hot climate; in this case, choose a lightly shaded area. Daylilies also enjoy a regular feeding of organic fertilizer every two months during the growing season to maintain their bloom color.

They are tough, adaptable, vigorous-growing plants that will thrive in nearly all kinds of soil; however, the best is soil that is moist, but well drained, fertile and humus-rich. Whether your soil is light and sandy or heavy clay, add Gardner & Bloome Soil Building Compost planting mix. Mulch the soil with compost bark in the spring and in the fall to minimize weeds and retain soil moisture.

Here at Westwood Gardens, we have numerous daylily hybrids for you to choose from.