7 Tricks to Give Your Hanging Baskets a Fall Refresh

Hanging baskets provide spreading color at eye level. They’re indispensable in ornamental gardens, adding living floral decor to patios, porches, and balconies. Use these seven tricks from backyard gardener Jerad Bryant to have full, bodacious baskets throughout the fall season.

Written by Jerad Bryant Horticulture review by Sarah Jay Last updated: September 5, 2024 | 5 min read

A row of fall hanging baskets filled with different flower varieties hung in a sunny area

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Maybe you bought a fuschia-filled basket in spring, or you made one recently with perennials and annuals from your garden. No matter what kind of hanging basket you own, fall weather causes changes in different species, with some growing new sprouts and others going dormant for winter. Listen to their needs, and they’ll give you one last hurrah of blooms before the season’s end.

If you’re in the market for fall hanging baskets, choose ones with perennials and annuals that appreciate cool, moist weather. Instead of verbena, petunias, and geraniums, choose heuchera, black mondo grass, and asters.

While reblooming perennials look fantastic in containers, summer annuals decline with cool nights and wet climates. We’ll use various methods like cutting back, replacing, and deadheading to force plants into bloom. We’ll also choose fall foliage plants that work as decorative backdrops for wildflowers.

These seven tricks will steer you in the right direction. Your baskets will rebound with growth, and your neighbors will ask how you keep them alive and tidy!

Move Baskets To New Sites

Multiple woven containers placed in a row, with different blooms in the containers and surrounding them, having various colors — Choose the right location for the blooms based on their needs, such as placing them in lower or shadier areas.

Autumn arrives as daylight hours shorten, temperatures lower, and higher rainfall occurs. The sun also rises lower in the sky in states north of the equator, meaning there’s less light available in your garden. Hanging baskets once basking in sunlight may now be hiding under shade for the fall months.

Move baskets to sunny locations to encourage their plants to bloom, sprout, and spread. If you lack sunny hanging spots, consider transplanting some of the basket’s perennials into the ground and refilling them with shade-loving plants. You’ll enjoy the perennials while your new container plantings thrive in your garden.

If your baskets are in the shade for longer than a week, you’ll want to slowly transition them to brighter conditions. Move them to their new spot for a few hours each day, then move them back into the shade. After a week’s transition, they should be ready to sit in their new home consistently.

Maintain Consistent Moisture

Someone watering blooms in a container using a red watering can, with bright and vibrant red petals surrounded by green leaves — The roots tend to dry out quickly if they are planted in these containers.

Long summer days invite drought and heat stress for container plants. Their roots are higher above the ground than in-ground perennials, and the shallow roots are more susceptible to temperature swings. They also dry out quicker and experience slow growth during repetitive periods of dry weather.

Maintain consistent soil moisture in containers, watering daily throughout hot summer months. As fall arrives, cool temperatures cause less water to evaporate. Water less during fall, but still ensure consistent moisture levels. If your plants stop growing and have dry soil, they likely need irrigation for a few days to bounce back.

Wet-loving perennials will need more water than summer hardy annuals, and shade plants need less water since their soil dries slowly. Use the finger test to determine if they’re thirsty—stick your finger into the pot, then see if you feel moisture. If moist, hold off on watering for a day. If dry, water well and test the soil again in a day or two.

Pinch Leggy Perennials

A row of container hung at a high place, having beautiful blooms appearing brightly colored surrounded by vivid green leaves — Pinching the tips can encourage better growth.

Basket plants often scramble with lengthy stems, reaching every which way they can to sprout new growth. Pinching is an age-old technique for encouraging bushy growth with more blooms than non-pinched plants. Wherever you cut back stems, two new ones will grow in their place. With repetitive pinching, your ornamentals grow dense and tidy.

Some annuals take pinching well, too, like petunias and bacopa. Research the varieties your basket contains to be sure they accept pinching. Most fleshy perennials and annuals appreciate it, recovering quickly during fall weather. If perennials or annuals die back, they won’t accept pinching. Replace annuals and leave perennials for their dormancy period.

If stems have blooms on them that you’d rather not cut off, leave those stems. Pinch back all others without flowers, then pinch back the big one after the blooms fade.

With weekly or biweekly cutting back, your baskets will grow bushy. Some gardeners prefer a few long stems to trail down—use this cutting-back technique to acquire your basket style of choice, whether long and stringy or compact and dense.

Deadhead Old Blooms

Close-up of a female gardener deadheading a plant in the garden on a blurred green background. The gardener holds red pruning shears in her hands. — Container flowers benefit from deadheading.

Similar to roses, container plants appreciate deadheading. It’s a process of cutting flowers before they form seeds to encourage more blooms. Weekly deadheading excursions will have your fall hanging basket species blooming from spring until the first frost as they rush to produce seeds.

Some species don’t need deadheading and grow as best as they please. Others, like coneflowers and verbena, can be deadheaded all summer but it helps to leave a few blooms to form seeds at summer’s end. That way you can sow new seedlings for the next year.

Here are some more examples of plants that don’t require deadheading:

Common Name	Scientific Name
Black-eyed Susan	Rudbeckia hirta
Purple Coneflower	Echinacea purpurea
Garden Balsam	Impatiens balsamina
Astilbe	Astilbe ssp.
Reblooming Petunias	Petunia ssp.

Newer flower varieties are reblooming, and they’ll continue flowering with or without deadheading. Older cultivars lack reblooming abilities, but deadheading forces them to rebloom. ‘The Wave®’ and ‘Supertunia®’ are two series of annual petunias that rebloom readily—find them available at your local nursery from spring through fall.

Replace Dead Plants

A close-up of a fading purple cosmos, its petals drooping sadly amidst blurred stems and another flower in the background, portraying the beauty of wilting nature. — Replace dead annuals with varieties that bloom during the cold months.

As annuals begin to fade in fall, it’s sometimes better to replace them than coax more life out of them. Use annuals and perennials that bloom under cool weather or that grow interesting foliage during the fall to take their place. Zinnias, pansies, and sweet peas are excellent substitutes that tolerate cool temperatures.

If you’d like cold-hardy options that survive the winter, choose winter or early spring blooming perennials. Hellebores, primula, and daffodil or snowdrop bulbs grow gorgeous flowers despite freezing temperatures in fall, winter, or spring, depending on your local conditions.

Foliage plants that lack flowers are perfect for hanging baskets during the fall. They are often more frost-tolerant than wildflowers and provide color and texture when most other plants are dormant or dead. Use species like sedge grass, tassel ferns, and black mondo grass.

Fertilize With A Low Dose

Close-up of a gardener in white gloves pouring liquid fertilizer into a large green watering can in the garden. — For urgent nutritional needs, use a liquid fertilizer that takes effect quickly.

Depending on how late or early it is in the fall season, you can use a low dose of organic fertilizer to boost foliage, flower, and fruit growth. Use a liquid fertilizer for quick-acting nutrient release, as powders and pellets take longer to decompose. Mix the amendment with water, then apply it to your containers.

Rather than fertilizer, you can also add a layer of compost to your baskets. A spring and fall addition of this organic amendment introduces worms, fungi, and bacteria that bolster your plants’ pest and disease resistance. Leaf mulch, dead leaves, or wood chips also work well in place of compost.

Hold off on fertilizing if fall frost is forecast in your area in the next two weeks. Excess nutrients cause weak, tender growth to occur, making them more vulnerable to frost damage. Let plants harden off naturally as your first frost date approaches. Compost is a slow-acting exception—you can apply it year-round without issue.

Overwinter Hanging Baskets

Flowers in a white container dangling against wall, covered in snow with the environment appearing cold with ample sunlight — You can overwinter certain flower varieties outdoors.

Fall hanging baskets with perennials may overwinter outdoors if they’re frost-hardy. If not, you can store them while they’re dormant in a garage, protected patio, or greenhouse. Ambient, warm temperatures keep perennial roots safe until spring.

Avoid bringing baskets indoors until you inspect them for pests. Look to leaves, flowers, and roots to see larvae, beetles, or aphids roaming. They may not be issues outdoors, but they’ll spread exponentially within the mild conditions of our homes.

If you spot pests and would still like to bring your basket indoors, spray a mixture of neem oil, insecticidal soap, and water. Use a ratio that the product label recommends, as certain concentrates are stronger than others. After a horticultural oil application, your baskets are safe to overwinter indoors in a bright location.