ISPEND A FAIR chunk of change each year on annual flowers. I won’t disclose how much because my editors might think I am one of those independently wealthy types who doesn’t have to worry about paying the property taxes – and cut my meager weekly wages. I like annuals because most of them will bloom all summer, they do well in pots and planters, and are great for filling holes in flower beds.

Annuals at the garden center come in a range of prices. First are the six-packs, which are the best value. These are common varieties that were started by seed locally back in March. Then there are annuals in 4-inch pots, many of them trademarked, named varieties (Proven Winners is one company that produces good ones).

So, for example, I can buy 6 impatiens plants for $3.25 at my favorite farm stand or one double impatiens (with blossoms like little roses) with variegated leaves for $4.25. I bought some of each. The double ones were bigger plants, and showier. The farmer bought the fancy ones as plugs -tiny plants - instead of seeds, so her cost was higher.

My window box Let’s look at petunias. The old fashioned petunias my mother grew were a pain in the youknow where. As a teenager I was given the job of pinching off spent blossoms to tidy up the plants and encourage them to bloom more. After all, if the blossoms stayed on the plants, they produced seeds and the petunias stopped blooming – thinking that their work was done and progeny were likely.

Modern ‘Supertunias’ are what is called, “self-cleaning”. That means the blossoms fall off and teenagers can continue doing what they like to do: texting, twittering and tweeting. No need to go outside and cut off the blossoms. Some greenhouse managers suggest pinching them off anyway, but I don’t. And my Supertunias are truly bodacious.

African Daisies Many modern annual flowers are bred to depend on regular inputs of liquid fertilizer. In order to keep on cranking out those blossoms they need extra nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium. Chemical fertilizers work fine, but I don’t use them – and mine do just fine. Instead of providing regular doses of chemicals to my window box and potted plants, I prepare a good nutritious planting mix and give them an occasional dose of liquid fish fertilizer (FYI: my cats are not interested in it).

When potting up annuals I make the following blend in a wheelbarrow: one 5-gallon pail of compost and one 5-gallon pail of potting mix. To that I add a heaping shovel of garden soil. Sometimes I add some coarse sand for drainage. I add a cup of organic bagged fertilizer (Pro- Gro) and stir it all up.

I squeeze and heft the mix. If it is light and crumbly I am done. If it sticks together or feels too heavy I add something to lighten it- perlite or vermiculite. They are heat-expanded minerals, even though perlite –white and fluffy – looks like Styrofoam chips. The amount I add varies – 3 quarts is about right, most often. Sorry if I am not being more precise, but making a soil mix is more an art than a science.

Most potting mixes are largely peat moss. Peat moss keeps a mix light-weight and does not compact the way ordinary garden soil would. But is has very few minerals that are available to plants. It is not a substitute for a good soil. If you plant in a 100% commercial potting mix, you will need to “feed” the plants with liquid fertilizers every week or so – good for the chemical companies, not so good for your budget.

In my window box I am growing, along with Supertunias, Angelface or Angelonia. It sends up multiple spikes of purple flowers. After a month or so each spike is spent, and I cut it off. This stimulates new spikes to pop up from the base plant. I don’t cut them all off at once as that would leave an ugly empty spot in my planting.

Many annuals originated in South Africa where the climate is hot and dry. My front walkway gets baked by the afternoon sun, so I grow annuals there. Some that I enjoy are lisianthus, Salvia ‘Black and Blue’, annual poppies (which just bloom once, no matter what), African daisy, salpiglossis, various verbenas and a few pansies. The pansies provide early color, will go dormant in mid-summer, and start blooming again in the fall.

I also plant foliage plants. Two that do very well for me are licorice plant (Helichrysum petiolare) and Persian Shield (Strobilanthes dyeranus). Licorice plant comes with either gray or chartreuse leaves; Persian Shield has the most amazing combination of purple, silver and pink leaves.

It’s never too late to plant more annuals. The trick is finding them at the garden center, as many kinds are sold out. But most places are having sales right now, so go buy some and mix them into your flower beds or fill up some pots.

Henry Homeyer is a gardener and the author of three books. Contact him at henry.homeyer@comcast.net of P.O. Box 364, Cornish Flat, NH 037476.