That's how a friend of mine in the Chicagoland industry characterized the landscape planting season this year. Lingering cool, coronavirus cancelations, then re-books! Followed now by entire city closures due to protests. What's next?!

Answer: Heat
June is typically the month that all states are experiencing rising temperatures. The South and Southwest are already scorching; the Midwest and Northeast are heating up (generally … I know, I know it's been cool and rainy in the Northeast this year!)

Attention now turns to the summer turn. Many of you may already have it in. If not, you're no doubt looking for RELIABLE heat-tolerant annual varieties for your commercial and residential clients. With that in mind, here is a top ten list for summer plantings. These species have proven themselves worthy over and over again in trials and landscapes.

Top summer annuals for heat for most markets (and our best selections per genera)

We have seen a sizable increase in sales of Coleus for summer markets. Both the seed forms (like Kong Jr's), and our Premium Sun Coleus lines as well.

We have added a number of great new colorsto our FlameThrower series, such as Salsa Roja, and Chili Pepper.

_{Coleus FlameThrower Salsa Roja}

_{Coleus FlameThrower Chili Pepper}

A new form is available with our MixMaster combo liners: Your grower can provide pots of "already mixed" Flamethrower series coleus. Just plant as you would normally and the result is a mixed bed of Coleus with far less work.

_{MixMasters Vindaloo Vision ... a blend of three FlameThrower Coleus!}

Be sure to follow proper planting techniques … like not planting too high! As the summer heat can toast newly planted plants easily. See our guide to proper planting techniques here.

Happy summer planting, everyone!