Getting to Grips with the Eye Catching Senetti

Ensuring that plants thrive is our second nature. And with Senetti it’s no different. With beautiful, blazing hues of purple, indigo, pink, magenta, blue and violet, and a fan-favourite of the bees, it’s no wonder more and more people are looking for expert advice in helping them thrive.

Care Advice

Although the eye-catching senetti have a good deal of resilience to the uncertainty of an Irish summer, there a few things you can do in order to get the most out of them. Plant your senetti with as much of a view of the sun as possible, but protected from bitter easterly winds. Senetti are thirsty plants needing regular watering, and while they can thrive in wet conditions, they’ll struggle in cold or frosty condtions lower than 0. So, make sure to give them a good drink around midday, as cold water can shock the roots. 

Slightly acidic soil – ideally with a pH of 5.6 using a peat-based compost is where they’ll feel most at home.

If you want to give your senetti blooms a longer life, deadheading the plant will prolong its flowering period throughout the summer. Faded flowers should be cut to around 6 inches. And what’s more, the flower also has a unique ability to rebloom. So, if you feel your senetti has finished blooming, cut it down to around half its size, and that should trigger a second bloom in 3-4 weeks.

Source: Pexels

For deadheading, feed the plant with liquid potash-based food to promote healthy leaf and stem growth, so it can easily grow back the faded flower heads. And when it comes to feeding, senetti can be hungry little flowers, needing some good nourishment every two weeks with tomato or all-purpose feed.

Source: Pexels

And periodically check in on them. Check the lowest flower on the plant for signs of greenfly or root rot. Flowers can go over when insects gather on them, potentially causing the collapse of the whole plant. Compost that’s too wet can cause root rot, which can also threaten the plant collapsing.

Source: Pixabay

GET IN TOUCH.

Gardens really are our second nature. So if you’d like help with this, or anything else in your corner of second nature, please reach out to us on social media, or by email on hello@countrylife.ie. If the question is quite specific, it’s really helpful to include a photo. We’d love to help.


SHOP PRODUCTS

All products mentioned in the above blog can be bought on countrylife.ie or in you local Tirlán CountryLife branch. To find your nearest store click here.

Westland Gardener’s MultiPurpose Compost 50L

The Gardeners Multi-Purpose Compost offers the best planting conditions making it ideal for use all around the garden.

Price: €7.99


Vitax Liquid Tomato Feed 1L

.Just one litre of this high concentrate liquid fertiliser makes 60 gallons of feed. This high potash fertiliser is specially developed to promote bumper crops.

Price: €5.50


Miracle-Gro All Purpose Plant Food 1L

The Miracle-Gro All Purpose Concentrated Liquid Plant Food contains carefully balanced nutrients and trace elements to feed plants in pots, containers, hanging baskets and borders. This formula grows plants twice as big and encourages beautiful, healthy plants with more blooms. 

Price: €6.49