How to make a standard?

I see in several catalogs, "Excellent for hanging basket or standard." How can this be? The two are so different...hanging and upright. How does one go about making a plant into a "standard?" Also descriptions say "can be trained to hang downward." If a plant wants to climb, how do you get it to hang down in a hanging basket? Duck tape? LOL

I'm not sure about training a plant to trail rather than climb, I always think plants look best when allowed to do their natural thing but some people like to do different things with it.

Standards are quite easy to create but time consuming. Upright Fuchsias (as opposed to trailers) are probably the easiest to start with. Here is a web site which explains the process much better than I can.

http://www.fuchsialand.co.uk/standard.htm

Some upright Fuchsias are good for hanging baskets as the competition will restrict the roots enough to slow the growth of even a fairly vigorous Fuchsia.

Cool! Makes me wanna grow fuchsia now!

I seem to be inundated with Fuchsias! Still, the berries are quite tasty so I'm not going to complain.

Berries? They grow berries? Dagnabbit...I better go order some.

Shoe haven't you seen my Fuchsia jam recipe? Flowers are edible too.

oh my...I've been in the dark. story of my life.
what to do...what to do...
so what kind of fushsia do I go buy, and raise for the rest of my life?

Shoe

Any will produce berries but (there's always a snag isn't there LOL) some have larger berries and some have sweeter. Since there are literally thousands of Fuchsias and no one seems to eat them much these days, no one seems quite sure which is the best for berries. (I wonder if we could make it an experiment!)

I personally favour Fuchsia procumbens for large berries but the whole plant is very different to the rest of the genus. I'd suggest going for Fuchsia magellanica or any of the hybrids from that, it is about the hardiest you will get, it will however only survive temps down to about 26F until it is quite large.

Fuchsia procumbens
http://www.bluemts.com.au/MountTomah/images/South1.jpg

Wow...interesting looking plant. Thanks Baa.
Well, that does it, like I need another hobby plant! I'll bechecking 'em out!

Wish I could find a fuschia that was hardy to 95 degrees! They do alright here all winter and then poop out come late Spring!

Dale

Practically anything you can topiary you can make into a standard. Bay, Pelargonium, Rosemary its just finding something that would suit your climate. Here its a bit of a nightmare because they aren't always hardy enough to survive the winter outside.

Shoe

F procumbens is pretty but it's also tiny LOL, they still have large berries though.