Product Description

The most exciting new trend in garden design is the lush look of the tropics -- no matter where you live! If, like so many gardeners, you're a little bored with pastel flowers and rigid borders, welcome to the jungly garden, where the plants have huge shiny leaves, boldly colored foliage, ferny textures, and flame-colored flowers. Now that garden centers and nurseries are stocking banana plants, elephant ears, giant ferns, and Amazon lilies, you can have your own tropical garden no matter where you live. Whether you want to go the whole way and turn your suburban yard into a jungle paradise or simply want to grow a few tropical plants in containers, you'll add pizzazz to your garden and your gardening experience by indulging in these exciting new plants. How do you grow tropical plants in a cold climate? The way you grow annuals or other tender perennials -- you plant new ones each season or winter them over indoors. And you can even include hardy plants with a tropical look to augment the true denizens of the junble. If you've ever bemoaned the sorry appearance of an August garden, tropicals are the perfet answer -- their leaves stay fresh and they bloom undaunted by summer's worst heat. In HOT PLANTS FOR COOL CLIMATES, you will find both inspirational photographs and solid information on how to design a flamboyant tropical landscape and grow the plants that make it happen no matter where you live.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1153742 in Books
• Published on: 2000-02-08
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 228 pages

Amazon.com Review
Using flamboyant plants to evoke tropical gardens is the hottest trend in the gardening world, perhaps best described as the "banana and canna" style of garden design. Hot Plants for Cool Climates makes clear, for those of us without greenhouses or the time and muscles to dig and wrap plants for winter, that this look can be achieved by using tropical-looking hardy plants or by planting container gardeners that can be moved indoors before first frost.

Most tropical plants are perennial in their native habitats, and if we lived in Hawaii, we too could grow agaves, Elephant's Ear, and Angel's Trumpet outdoor year-round. For those of us who garden in less benign climates, the authors give instructions on mulching and wrapping such plants to protect them from freezes. It involves straw and burlap and leaves the plants looking like mummified little soldiers, but able to withstand temperatures 20 degrees lower than without protection.

The gardens pictured in the plentiful color photographs are certainly tempting, as they overflow with huge leaves, flashy foliage, exotic flowers, ponds and vines, all combined into the rich tapestry of a jungle. You can almost smell the jasmine and hear the chattering of the parrots. Thankfully, the chapter on hardy plants for the tropical look (bamboos, grasses, hardy bananas, ferns, Petasites) puts this style of garden within the reach of most gardeners, no matter if they live in Minnesota or California. Especially useful are the appendices, which list plants for a variety of design situations and a source list for the plants recommended throughout the book. --Val Easton

From Publishers Weekly
Garden fashion turns outrageous in this spirited call for cool-climate gardens to shed their English-borne respectability and don the dress of tropical wilds. With their typically hot and humid summers, gardens from Virginia to Minnesota and Oregon can mimic a Hawaiian paradise or a Costa Rican rain forest with layers of hanging greenery, contrasting leafy textures, gargantuan flowers and riotous color. Emboldened by Roth's (Four-Season Landscape) prose and Schrader's knowledge (he is the foremost grower of tropical plants in the New York metro area), readers can start with one of several simple container plantings or design an entire garden room around a temple of faux ruins. Gardeners will come to think of tropicals as big annuals that come into their own when the typical perennial garden is headed for ruin, learn how to begin with tropical-like cold-hardy plants and get the feel for garden design based on contrasting textures and a dominant vertical presence. Half of the book is devoted to an encyclopedia of 100 tropical plants and useful plant lists, categorized by color and pattern. This is certainly one of the liveliest and best-organized presentations on the tropical trend in gardening.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
Roth, author of a long list of gardening books, and Schrader, a tropical plant grower in New York, team here to present the latest gardening craze. They explain why the tropical look has become popular, what the various tropical regions are and how their plants are distinctive, how to plan a garden with a tropical look, and how to care for and overwinter the plants. (This section is lavishly illustrated with photos of tropical gardens in temperate-zone locations.) The last half of the book is an "Encyclopedia of Plants"; for each plant, there is a color photo, and the scientific and popular names are given. The plant's habitat, size, and hardiness are provided. Following these basic elements, an article gives more detailed descriptions, suggested uses, and cultivation requirements. The first appendix consists of lists of plants classified by characteristics, e.g., "Tropical Plants with Colorful Leaves." Appendix 2 provides "Sources for Tropical and Tropical-Looking Hardy Plants." Recommended for comprehensive collections or where there is interest.ACarol Cubberley, Univ. of Southern Mississippi, Hattiesburg
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Customer Reviews

Hot Ideas in Hot Plants
Simply put, this book is the most exciting, helpful and practical book I have seen in quite a while when it comes to ideas about innovative approaches to gardening in cool climates. It is a treasure chest of ideas on the cutting edge of what's happening. If you are into geraniums and other pedestrian plant material, look elsewhere. If you are curious about what's new, hot and exciting, this book is for you. The photos are dazzling and the narrative is so well written, even an amateur like myself felt totally comfortable. This book has already become my gift of choice for friends and family who care about their gardens.

An excellent resource
As a professional horticulturist gardening in zones 5 through 7, I have searched high and low for a good reference book on tropical and subtropical plants. At last I have found it!

Hot Plants for Cool Climates is informative, interesting and well-organized. The design suggestions are new and exciting, and the encyclopedia is stuffed with detailed information regarding cultivation. Particularly helpful were the cultivar names listed under each species (god help me, how did they ever whittle down the list under Coleus?) and the overwintering tips.

Serious amateurs and professionals alike will benefit from owning this book.

You'll love this book!
Although I am a mere "weekend, small-patch" kind of gardener, I have found that "Hot Plants for Cool Climates" is as wonderful to own as some of my favorite cookbooks. The stories accompanying each plant description feed the imagination of a gardener as do ingredients in a recipe. Informative in its scope yet poetic in its breadth, this book is a delight to the heart as well as to the eye. This book makes it delicious to dream of someday tending a much larger garden, and it provides the reader with not only the creative inspiration, but also the tools of knowledge with which to plant a tropical paradise that can thrive in a temperate reality.