Red Flowers in the Fall

Annuals

• Love-lies-bleeding (Amaranthus caudatus) is an annual for full sun locations, growing to 4 feet and flowering from July until frost occurs. The unusual, blood red flowers of this tropical plant look like drooping tassels, making this plant a potential choice for your hanging baskets. French marigolds (Tagetes patula) is a Mexican and Guatemalan native, but grows as an annual in cooler climates. Red flowering varieties of this foot-tall plant are available, with the species flowering from June until fall. Rock gardens are a possible site for the moss rose (Portulaca grandiflora), a low-growing annual with flowers resembling those of the rose. Red varieties of this species, which blooms from June through initial frost, are obtainable.

Deciduous Shrubs

• The roses are prominent among the deciduous shrubs able to generate red fall flowers. Cultivars such as the miniature rose "Black Jade" do so, with this 24-inch high specimen producing dark red flowers as early as May and into October. "Don Juan" is a large-flowered climbing rose maturing to as tall as 10 feet, suitable for planting in U.S. Department of Agriculture plant hardiness zones 5 through 9. "Firefighter" is a hybrid tea rose, growing to 4 feet in zones 7 through 11. It features deep red flowers from May until October. Each flowers possesses as many as 45 petals and they are extremely fragrant, notes the Washington State University Clark County Extension.

Perennials

• In the same family as the milkweeds, the blood flower (Asclepias curassavica) blooms much longer than most of its cousins do, lasting well into the fall. This tropical perennial for USDA zones 9 through 11 works to attract bees, hummingbirds and butterflies with its orange-red flowers. Chrysanthemums are not just yellow; the "Brandi" cultivar features dark red flowers for containers, beds and borders. Brandi blooms from September until it becomes too cold, growing to 18 inches high. "Garnet Brocade" is a cultivar of stonecrop (Sedum) that is cold hardy to USDA zone 3. This 14-inch tall perennial has attractive purple-bronze leaves in addition to its garnet red flowers in bloom from August through October.

Others

• "Serotina" is a cultivar form of woodbine (Lonicera periclymenum), a twining vine capable of surviving to USDA zone 4. Serotina stays in bloom later than the parent species does, being still in flower during the fall. Its flowers' exterior is a purple shade of red. The Camellia reticulata cultivar "Dataohung" is a broadleaf evergreen shrub with red fall flowers. Chinese in origin, the shrub is appropriate for the warmth of zones 8 through 10. Its red flowers are up to 7 inches across.