Anemone Planting Guide

Anemones (also known as Windflowers) are one of the best-bang-for-your-buck varieties. One of the easiest ways to add colour and beauty to your Spring garden. Simple to grow, and incredibly floriferous.

These tiny little Rhizomes pack a real punch! Anemones are fantastic planted in mass, and make a great cut flower. To prolong your display, they can be stagger planted.

The Anemone coronaria De Caen varieties are all single flowered, and are often referred to as "Florist" or "Poppy-flowered" anemones. The Anemone coronaria ‘St Brigid’ varieties are double flowered (twice the petals).

The genus, Anemone, the name of which is derived from the Greek word for 'wind' (anemos), includes about 65 species.

Anemones can be planted anytime from March through to late May.

Planting in the ground or in pots…

• Prior to planting, we recommend chilling your Anemones in the paper bag they arrived in, for around 3-5 weeks. This will give them a good kick start.

• Anemones are best planted in full Sun, or a semi shaded position, and are well suited for pots.
• It’s essential to have free draining soil, but this can be rectified by raising your beds with compost and other soils if you’re in a heavy clay type area.
• Before planting, soak the Anemone Rhizomes in water for around 2 hours.
• Loosen the soil to a depth of around 10-15cm, and mix in some Bulb Food.
• Simply push the small Rhizomes into the soil (pointy part facing downwards) with your finger, to a depth of around 3 - 5cm.
• Soak well once planted, and continue to soak well every week until shoots emerge, and then keep them moist but not wet.

Anemones are reasonably heavy feeders, so a few side dressings of fertiliser over their growing period can help to prolong their flowering significantly.

Anemones are great as cutflowers, however unlike Ranunculus, it’s recommended to let the flowers open and close for a couple of nights before picking - this will prolong their vase life.

Once the foliage has died back in late Spring, you can harvest the Anemone Bulbs (Rhizomes), or simply leave them to pop up next year. Note that Anemones won’t do as well in subsequent seasons, so if you’re wanting a beautiful display every year it’s recommended to buy in new stock each season (new stock from Bulbs Direct is younger, and much more floriferous)