Growing fuchsias

Fuchsias hang their flowers like small bells through the summer. Gardeners grow them in borders, pots, hanging baskets and even hedges. Some fuchsias are hardy and some are tender, and the two need different care.

Hardy or tender

Hardy and tender fuchsias look very similar. The Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) advises checking the label before buying.

Hardy fuchsias are shrubs that stay outside all year, in a border or a container. Tall kinds can make a hedge.

Tender fuchsias flower from mid-summer until the first frosts of autumn. They spend the winter indoors, somewhere free of frost.

Planting a hardy fuchsia

The RHS suggests planting hardy fuchsias in early summer. A fuchsia planted between autumn and spring is open to cold damage in its first winter.

They do best in sun or dappled shade. They grow in most soils, and struggle where the ground is very wet or very dry.

In a border, the RHS suggests setting the base of the plant 5cm deeper than the soil level. The covered stems give the crown extra protection in winter.

Fuchsia hedges grow well in mild places, such as cities, southern England, coastal Wales, Cumbria and the west coast of Scotland. In colder places, the winter kills them to the ground.

Pots and hanging baskets

Tender fuchsias with an upright habit give height in the middle of a container. Trailing kinds tumble over the edge of a hanging basket.

They go outside once the risk of frost has passed, generally in mid to late spring. In pots and baskets they need water every day, while fuchsias in the ground need it about once a week in dry spells.

Pinching out the shoot tips of a young plant makes it bushier. It also delays flowering by up to eight weeks after the last pinch, so the RHS advises pinching early, in late winter and spring.

Through the winter

Hardy fuchsias usually die back a little over winter. In early spring, gardeners cut the dead growth back to live shoots. In colder gardens, all of last year's growth may need cutting to the ground, and the plant grows again from the base.

Tender fuchsias in the ground are lifted and kept in a frost-free greenhouse, on a windowsill or in a conservatory. Plants in pots can simply come inside.

A standard fuchsia, trained as a small tree, needs winter protection even when it is a hardy kind. Its stem is easily hurt by frost.

Taking cuttings

The RHS calls fuchsias excellent plants for a first try at growing new plants from cuttings. With a hardy fuchsia, hardwood cuttings are the easiest way.

In late autumn, the gardener cuts woody stems about the length of a pencil, with brown bark on them. They go half into a pot of cutting compost and spend the winter somewhere cool and frost-free. New shoots appear in spring.

Tender fuchsias root most easily from softwood cuttings, taken from spring to early summer.

Pests and diseases

Fuchsia gall mite is too small to see without a microscope. It turns the shoot tips into a swollen, twisted mass instead of leaves and flowers. It was first found on mainland Britain in 2007.

Cutting off the affected tips removes many of the mites, though the new growth often becomes affected again. The RHS says the cut-off tips can go in council waste or be buried.

Fuchsia rust is a fungus that leaves orange pustules under the leaves. Glasshouse whitefly and vine weevil grubs also attack fuchsias, and the RHS finds these usually easy to control.

The spelling

Fuchsias are named after Leonhard Fuchs, a German botanist of the Renaissance. That is why the plant is spelt fuchsia. Many people type it as "fuschia", which is how this site's name is spelt.