Choosing plants for your Affinity
There is a large variety of attractive flowering and foliage plants that would be ideal for an Affinity Living Feature Pool. Plants are an easy, low maintenance addition to the pool. A few species that we would recommend:
Marginal (for the supplied planting basket)
Acorus calamus ‘Variegatus’ is a handsome, sword-like plant with cream and green variegated leaves.
Butomus umbellatus has narrow, slightly twisted foliage with umbels of rose-pink flowers in the summer.
Caltha palustris ‘Flore Pleno’ is a native aquatic plant which has compact clumps of dark green leaves. Being native it is early, announcing spring with a profusion of double, bright yellow flowers.
Iris Laevigata, the asiatic water iris is a clump forming plant with tall, sword-like leaves. This variety has blue flowers during early and mid summer, but there are other colour-forms including white, purple and pink.
Deep water marginals
Aponogeton distachyos, the water hawthorn provides interesting sword-like leaves that lay on the water surface, green and often dappled with purple splashes. Vanilla-scented blossoms appear on stems with white ‘flowers’ with black stamens throughout the year.
Waterlilies
Pygmy Waterlilies such as;
Nymphaea ‘Pygmaea Alba’ pygmy white waterlily has elegant, tiny paper white flowers produced amongst small dark green oval leaves.
Nymphaea ‘Pygmaea Helvola’ has beautiful soft yellow flowers. It is reliable and free-flowering. The flowers grow between the olive green and purple speckled leaves.
Nymphaea ‘Pygmaea Rubra’ has tiny, rich red flowers with a bright contrasting orange centre. Again flowers amongst the attractive purple/ green leaves.
Hardy floating plants
Stratiotes aloides, the water soldier is a popular floating plant that resembles a small pineapple top. Paper fine, small creamy white flowers appear in its leaf axils in summer. These plants over winter as small plantlet or buds, and remain dormant until the growing season.
Nymphoides peltata the water fringe has a mass of round floating ‘pads’ and golden yellow blossoms that protrude through the surface through the summer months.
Annual (non-hardy) floating plants
Pistia Stratiotes, the Water Lettuce is an attractive tropical floating plant that forms clumps of soft, hairy, ribbed green leaves. As this plant in non-hardy it will not cope with the UK winter temperatures. Replace each spring.
Hardy submerged plants
Ceratophyllum demersum the Rigid Hornwort is another popular attractive oxygenator. Best potted up into a small aquatic planting basket in the bottom of the pool.
Potamogeton crispus otherwise know as ‘curly pond weed’ has attractive wavy translucent bronze foliage borne on longs stems. This plant produces small red and yellow flowers that appear through the water surface on spikes. Again, pot up into a small aquatic planting basket in the bottom of the pool.