what to plant now

Ive been gifted a pot for christmas . It is about 30cm deep and i think i will put it in the front garden. Any ideas about what i can plant. I want to do this in Jan 2024 as i dont want the pot indoors. It would be nice to have something that will fruit and be ever green or something that will make people go ooooooooooo when they walk past .

 

Do you want edible fruit? I'm not sure if there's any evergreen edible fruit apart from strawberries.

 

Yep, dont we all.

 

You can get an evergreen blueberry. They are self fertile too

 

Chilean guava, Ugni molinea small edible fruit, attractive evergreen foliage. So long as you are not in one of the colder parts of the the country and the spot outside is not subject to cold winds it should be fine with you.
By the way what diameter is your pot and has it got drainage holes?
It would be helpful if you could fill out the location part of your profile.

 

some of my friends have a habit of picking off fruit from plants eg at the train station so ideally edible ones while they wait for me to answer the door
As i say im open to an ever green potted plant that will make people say ooooh wow eg because of is colour or leaf shape etc if a fruit one is not possible

 

i have a blueberry plant but it lost all its leaves at the start of winter

 

not heard of this.
I can put some holes at the bottom and its about thirty cm wide
It is the only thing in the front garden so will have no protection from winds

 

Drainage holes are a must.

How about Alpine Strawberries? They are mostly evergreen, bear flowers and fruit all summer and tolerate draught. 30cm pot is quite small and will need daily watering in summer.

Hardy cactus would certainly have a wow- factor. Opuntia fruit are edible

Opuntia engelmannii mixed habitats Seedlings

 

Most blueberries are deciduous

 

arbutus unedo will have people going wow, what is that! The fruit is edible, it's evergreen and will last in a pot for quite a few years before out growing it's space. You will, in the meantime, be taking cuttings or seeding it to replace it

 

Or you'll decide it's worthy of it's own space in the garden. Beautiful tree that merits as much space as it wants !

 

30cm container is not very big and tall growing plants risk toppling over.

But agree, Arbutus Unedo is a fine tree definitely worth growing It's on my must-have list when I finally get my own place. They have a beautiful rooftop garden in London Canary Warf with a small Arbutus forest, and the best display so far is next to Solfatara volcano in Naples.

Amazing that the plant is hardy also up here.

 

Im afraid i dont like the look of the cactus from what i can see online but it will attract attention as i haven't seen any front gardens with a cactus, may be worth thinking about this more. will i survive the uk rainy season ?
The alpine strawberry looks ok, any idea how tall it grows ?

 

arbutus unedo looks nice , but is it really a pot plant, im seeing 2ft high trees but im not 100% sure the pot is suitable for this