Vines for Cascading Walls

Flowering Vines

Morning glories provide a rainbow of colors on cascading walls with trumpet-shaped flowers in hues of scarlet, magenta, pink and blue. Moonflower, in the same family as morning glories, produces fragrant white flowers that bloom at dusk, stay open all night and close at sunrise. Different varieties of clematis have flowers that range from small to large. Climbing roses fill the air with heady, sweet scents. Other easy-to-grow flowering vines include sweet pea, purple hyacinth bean, Carolina jessamine, trumpet creeper and wisteria.

To grow twining vines on a wall, you have to provide something for them to wrap around such as a wire mat or trellis. Cape honeysuckle produces red-orange blooms with a strong, sweet scent. Carolina jasmine has a powerful aroma and yellow flowers, and confederate jasmine emits a pleasing fragrance and blooms in hues of white, red and purple. If you prefer blue flowers, choose a clock vine, and pick black-eyed Susan vines for yellow flowers with chocolate-color centers.

Like twining vines, woody vines need support and have to be coaxed through latticework or thin fencing material like chicken wire to thrive. These supports can be laid flat on walls and will disappear as the vines overtake them. Climbing hydrangea is a hardy woody vine with white, fragrant blossoms. Other woody flowering vines include allamanda, which has sunny yellow flowers; Petrea or queen’s wreath, which produces violet blue flowers like wisteria; mandevillea, a producer of trumpet-shaped pink flowers; and bougainvillea, a vine with variegated blooms. Creeping fig has evergreenlike leaves but no flowers.

The majority of vines thrive best in full sun and moderate precipitation. They tend to lose leaves near the roots as they grow, but the tops eventually grow long enough to hang down and cover the base. To keep the vine growth on the walls consistent, prune thin areas to encourage branch growth. Vines respond well to plant food and will grow much faster when regularly fed. Periodically check the vines and walls for pests and eradicate them with solutions formulated to protect the vines and flowers from blight.