What is the difference between hardy and perennial

Calendula are another annual which are easy to raise from seed and provide lots of seed at the end of the summer for next year. Calendula are also known as the Pot or English Marigold, and are loved by pollinators ideal to grow alongside the veg plot. You can also have a continuous supply of garden rocket.

It is another annual which sets seed abundantly at the end of the season and can be collect ready for next year. Split open the little pods and carefully clean out the seed and you have free plants for next year. Biennials are seedlings one year, flower and set seed the next year. Although their life cycle is two years, you will find that they appear continuously in your garden.

The seedlings of the second year becoming the flowers of the next year and so on. Some perennials are woody, such as Lavender, Sage, Artemisia, and Rosemary.

These woody shrubs and plants tend to have a shorter lifespan, beyond 2 years up to 15 years, depending on the growing conditions. The better the conditions, drier and sunnier, the longer the plant will survive.

Less hardy varieties tend to last only a few years. Tips on growing Lavender. Herbaceous Perennials last for many years, it can be decades.

During the winter months they die back to bare soil and are dormant. Above is a Hosta in winter. Herbaceous perennials push up lovely, fresh new growth in the spring and many, think of Delphiniums, Asters, Achillea, Poppies, add colour to a summer border. Agapanthus are just one of a huge group of perennial plants and will survive in the garden the frost hardy types, for many years. Interestingly, within the group of Agapanthus, there are both evergreen and herbaceous varieties, the latter being the most hardy and with better longevity.

Most gardeners think of a hardy plant as a perennial that will survive cold winters. The term "hardy annual " seems like an oxymoron, but hardy annual, along with half-hardy annual and tender annual, are actually distinctions long used in England to classify the relative cold tolerance of newly planted annual seeds. This can be confusing because seed germination and plant cold hardiness do not always overlap——a seed that can tolerate freezing ground temperatures may not grow into a plant that tolerates cold temperatures and vice versa.

The terminology has certainly become a gray area, but this is what the terms generally mean. Hardy annual seeds can handle being frozen in the soil and are often planted in fall or early spring. Most self-seeding annuals are considered hardy since they overwinter in the soil and germinate the following spring; these hardy annual flower seeds actually benefit from snow cover and frost.

Hardy annual seeds include:. Hardy annual plants are the most cold-tolerant annual plants. They can handle a slight freeze and are good choices for early fall and late spring planting. However, sustained freezing temperatures or a really dramatic dip in temperature will do them in.

Hardy annual plants will fare better if planted in the ground, rather than in containers, since the ground will insulate roots better than the small amount of soil in a container. And plants that have had time to adjust to increasingly cold weather will be hardier than those that suddenly encounter it. Common hardy annual plants include:. Half-hardy seeds can be direct sown after all danger of frost. Half-hardy annual seeds have a longer growing period, so in colder climates, they're typically started indoors four to eight weeks before the last frost date to ensure that they'll flower before the season is over.

However you don't need to wait until the warmer weather to get going — sow your seeds or grow your seedlings in a light, frost-free place, protecting them under cover until the frosts are over. Click here to browse all our half-hardy annual plants and our half-hardy annual seeds. Biennials are plants whose lifecycle spans two years, so they flower, produce seeds and die in their second year.

If you are lucky, you may find they self-seed. Click here to browse all our biennial plants and our biennial seeds. Perennials are plants that stay in the garden from one year to the next. They make a brilliant investment and addition to your patch.

Click here to browse all our perennial plants and our perennial seeds. Herbaceous plants are non-woody plants that die back to rootstock each autumn and regrow the following spring. These perennials will flower in their first and second years similar to biennials and annuals , but may struggle after that and most generally die after a few years.

Therefore you may find these described as 'grown as a hardy annual' or similar.