Planting for Fall Color

Want the colorful splendor of your summer garden to linger until Jack Frost visits? You can set your autumn yard ablaze with more than the palette of falling leaves. Try these two fruity late-season bloomers, and you'll be treating yourself to a kaleidoscope of color that will make you eager for fall's shortened days.

Foliage isn't the only star in autumn's tapestry of color. On Virburnum Opulus Compactum, above right, gleaming red fruits dangle among leaves that shift to brilliant red as fall arrives. The berries hang on in winter, perfect for a shimmering addition to frost bouquets. White blooms blanket the branches in late spring. Big on color, this shrub is small in stature, reaching only 5 feet at maturity.

A great plant for fall color? Ornamental grasses; click here to learn more.

Add an irresistibly festive berry, purple-fruited beautyberry, right, to a shrub or perennial border. It's easy to grow and survives cold blasts to 20 degrees below zero. Pink flowers in late summer give way to purple or white berries tucked among yellow fall foliage. The fruits spread good cheer all winter in the garden or in a vase in the house. For best fruiting, plant several bushes together.