Pinot Grigio wrote:


The only bedding plants I get are busy-lizzies as if I sort of hide them,
the deer don't eat all of them! The rest are a waste of money. If the deer
don't eat them, the slugs will, or the squirrels will dig them up!
What I really want, are more cottage garden type plants that will flower
July onwards and self-seed like most of the current plants do.
Any suggestions please? I don't like red colours much and definitely not
orange.

Don't know about deer or squirrels but we do have a slug problem. Verbena
bonairensis seems to be reisistant to slugs and is really good value later
in the year, and I've been told self-seeds readily. I tried it for the firt
time last year so I haven't found out if this is true yet. What about hardy
geraniums? There are hundreds of varieties, a long flowering period, a
variety of colours in the pink, magenta, blue and white range, a range of
sizes and behaviours (ground-cover to mound-forming) and slug resistance. I
love them. Echinops (globe thistle), Eryngium (sea hollies) and teasles all
flower later in the year and are lovely stately plants (I believe the word
is architectural) and I've never seen a slug go near them. They all have
blue flowers. Teasels would surely deter deer too being rather spiky, look
great when the seed heads are left to overwinter and attract goldfinches
too. They certainly self-seed if they like the conditions! They'll take
over if you let them but I've found a few hours spent in early spring
digging out unwanted seedlings before the tap root really gets going sorts
them out. If you dead-head regularly the Geums seem to keep going well into
autumn (ours starts in spring so has a really impressive flowering period).
There are some yellow ones though others are red. How about fennel? Lovely
foliage and yellow flower heads later in the year. I suppose the deer might
have a taste for aniseed but the slugs don't like it. Mint too, although it
does get a bit rampant you could try and control it by planting it in a
bottomless bucket. Verbascums? Esp the type with big felty leaves. Scotch
thistles? Or even milk thistles (which rejoice in the lovely name of
Silybum): a bit too spiky for me but look lovely.

Hope you like some of these ideas.
Anita