Many thanks in advance
Claire

Sun - so much will be great. Try some grasses: Miscanthus gets big, fast. Nice and wild/prairie-looking. Helichrysum is a pale grey-leafed annual here that grows very fast into a sprawling silver mass, with everlasting-type flowers. If you can stand it, get some roses...visit a nursery - one or tow are worth the money, even for a year. It will be a year to remember!

I was just looking at the pictures of your balcony, WOW! That is just fantastic! And fruit and all sorts, you really have it like a proper garden. One thing I am curious about though, how did you get photos on to your page? I can't seem to work that out at all!

Claire

With respect to my pictures - Spike (the webmaster here) allows HTML code in the area of the member page where you can describe something about yourself, so you can actually enter the image code that will display pictures in with the text. I know a bunch of GW people have elaborate member's pages with background images, etc. LOL

You need to have a place that will host your photo (eg., Photobucket) and then that site will usually give you the exact code needed to cut and paste and place on a website like GW so that the image will show up. Hope that helps some.

For your climbing riot of colour in the sunny area: Sweet pea, runner bean, hyacinth bean, passiflora, mina lobata (which I think is called firecracker vine, please correct me), Cypress vine, Black eyed Susan vine and Cardinal climber vine. -Plus of course nasturtium and morning glory as you mentioned yourself.
As for when the last frost hits you, and you can start planting... Ask a local experienced gardener, or in the local garden center, they'll know. -Here it's May, but again it changes from area to area.

VGtar

I think I will give zucchini and or squash a go on my "shady" deck, I have been looking at the passage of the sun and I reckon it might not be as shady as I thought, come high summer. So there might be a good chance. I don't fancy those things up on the sunny deck, because it's a smaller area and we will want to be doing a certain amount of lounging about without hacking through the undergrowth of veg leaves!

Jesper you have some nice choices of climbers there on your list, thank-you. I have been looking at sweet pea varieties, runner beans that's a good idea! Look nice and edible too! I shall have to look up hyacinth bean, I haven't heard of that, or Cardinal climber vine. Food for thought, excellent.

Claire.

And it eventually produces purple pods (or pink or even white depending on which cultivar you get):

I was considering trying cardinal climber myself this year as I'm going to try to attract some hummingbirds up here. One little hummer found the honeysuckle on my balcony last August and now I'm hooked! LOL

Honeysuckles are fabulous aren't they? I have a nice one in my garden in Ireland, it didn't do too well the first year but the second year it really took off, and also took really well from cuttings, so I have a few babies around the garden now too! I can't remember the cultivar now, but it's pale white and yellow, and particularly fragrant.

Thanks for the putting up the photos, I am very interested in getting to do the same so am going to look into your explanation!

Cheers
Claire

Just stumbled over a thread on the container gardening forum with ideas for plants in shade.

By the way, you can also eat the pods of the hyacinth bean vine, while they are still quite small (I've never tasted them myself, but I've read that they should be really nice). -I remember my grandfather tried to grow one in the living room once. It grew and grew, but no flowers. By the time it had taken over the whole window, my grandmother got so tired of looking at it, that she threw it on the kitchen dump. Two weeks later, they had the prettiest dump I've ever seen.

I went to the shady front porch link, interesting. Thank you for thinking of me! I am going to paste all these interesting responses into a document so that I can refer to it later, I am getting a lot of ideas! I have had a north facing situation for house plants before, in a big victorian house with large sash windows and no central heating, fantastic for house plants like ivies and ferns . . . . never had the same situation for proper outdoor plants - especially never in the Boston climate! Interesting!!!

I have been given, this evening, a bunch of daffodils. What a lovely breath of the outdoors. I wonder where they may have been grown. They will be flowering right now in my garden in Ireland. Oh!!! I wish I could see them now!!! Oh well, all things change. I was there last year; I should be jjust gratefulthat I have the chance for a different outlook - ie being in America instead of Ireland for a year.

Thanks agian for that link
Claire. (sorry for spelling, 11pm, I have had some wine . . . )

It's ironic but the first time I actually saw a hummingbird up close was 20 years ago in Colorado. I had always heard they were around here, but living in the city (although I'm right on the suburban border), I never saw one. I saw this one buzzing around one of my weigelas that was reblooming on a branch that was hanging over the rail (a "Red Prince" weigela). It was small and brown-colored but the beak was unmistakable. I know the weigelas are supposed to be a known attractant, but I was surprised that it flew all the way the heck up here to spot those flowers. Guess it was a beacon in a sea of concrete! LOL Especially given the time of year that it stopped by - which is around when they start to migrate. I always loved weigelas since I grew up with one, which is why I have 2 plants now.

Interestingly enough, last spring I finally broke down and bought the Goldflame honeysuckle. I loved the flowers and made sure I sniffed first to make sure it had a scent and then I put it in a container on the balcony and had it climb a trellis that I had along a concrete column against the wall. The vine eventually grew to the ceiling and started hanging down and it was flowering with each new bit of vine growth. It eventually produced some side shoots with flowers on them that were dangling in mid air about 6ft (2 m) up. And later that week, I happened to step out on the balcony and saw the hummer buzzing around one of the dangling honeysuckle flowers. Of course once again, I froze like a deer in headlights! LOL By the time I thought to get the camera, it had flown off.

That did it for me! I actually had a thread about it on this forum here.

Yeah, I have a great view up here (part of what makes me stay), plus the balcony is fairly large so I can put a bunch of things out there.

But, that what gardening is all about eh? Bees pollinating your fruit bushes, I know bees will travel several miles for nectar, but vertically too - that's pretty determined!!

Jenny, how many plants did you have in that pot? -I've bought some hyacinth bean seeds in the botanical gardens, and on the packet it says I should sow 3-4 together in a pot, somehow I think that sounds like a lot. As I remember (it's about 20 years ago I've seen one) they branch out quite nicely. I was thinking maybe two plants for a 2- 2.5 gallon pot. -What do you think?

I too would be interested in how many Hyacinth Bean plants Jenny would grown in one pot.

I think I started 6 seeds, with 3 per 6" pot. I then transplanted into a 2ft long by 1ft wide trough and ran the vine up a wooden trellis in that trough and extended the trellis with the bamboo poles and some string. I'm going to do some more this year, along with Cardinal Climbers and Scarlet Runner beans. Yes I am trying to attract hummingbirds. LOL

Cheers
Claire