Wild plants are valuable sources of food for bees, bumblebees and butterflies. They are perfect for adding greenery to a balcony. You can decorate your balcony with wild perennials in pots, green facades with climbing plants or create a mini pond with aquatic plants.
How to design a balcony with wildflowers?
To create a balcony with wildflowers, you can place wild perennials in pots, attach climbing plants to balcony railings and walls, or create a mini pond with aquatic plants. Choose plant species with different growth and flowering times to make the balcony varied and insect-friendly throughout the growing season.
Wildflowers in pots
Perennials are suitable for planting in pots that can stay on the balcony in winter. Choose perennials that prefer dry locations. You have no problems with the limited space and the moderate nutrient content in the substrate. By cleverly combining species of different heights with different flowering times, you can enjoy the abundance of flowers throughout the entire growing season.
You should pay attention to this when putting it together:
- Choose species that grow at different heights
- mix taller growing species with shallow creeping plants
- place a medium-sized plant in the flower box every ten centimeters
The Carthusian carnation with its violet flowers, the upright ziest with its white petals and the yellow-flowering sun rose are considered plants of dry locations. Like the marsh marigold, the thick-leaved stonecrop serves as a low-growing gap filler.
Green balcony grilles and walls
Many balconies offer more space in height than in surface area. Climbing and climbing plants are suitable for adding greenery to bare facades, creating privacy screens and demarcating cozy niches. You can control the growth of the plants with a climbing aid (€99.00 on Amazon). Perennial self-climbing plants that do not require climbing support tend to spread uncontrollably.
Species and varieties of clematis that do not grow higher than two meters are suitable as climbing plants for trellises. The garden honeysuckle is a vigorous climbing plant that grows up to six meters high. In contrast to these species, ivy is not a climbing plant, but a climbing plant that anchors itself to a surface with adhesive roots. Ivy grows slowly and prefers shady locations.
Climbing roses provide lush blooms. With unfilled varieties you offer insects a valuable source of food. Double flowers do not produce nectar. Wild hops are a fast-growing perennial for shady locations that require a lot of moisture. Among the annual climbing plants, nasturtiums, runner beans, thunbergia and sweet peas are popular.
Aquatic plants in the mini pond
An old barrel or a waterproof container is suitable as a biotope for aquatic plants. It should be half filled with loamy sand and then filled with water. Place the mini pond in a shady location. Direct sunlight provides ideal growth conditions for algae. Water fleas and water snails act as natural filters. They feed on dead plant material. Floating leaf plants are suitable for planting.
Frog bite and floating pondweed or dwarf water lilies are ideal for the mini pond. Fir fronds grow both underwater and above the water surface. The aquatic plant develops dark green shoots that protrude from the water like small pine trees. Plant marsh plants such as yellow iris or swan flower in a pot placed in the water. This visual eye-catcher attracts insects such as water beetles or dragonflies.