This holiday weekend, garden retailers will begin rolling out their fall colors, and ornamental peppers will figure almost as large as chrysanthemums.

A trend that started a couple of years ago with 'Black Pearl', whose leaves are inky enough to be called black and whose round, deep-purple fruits mature to holiday red, advances this fall and next spring with additional colors. Breeders focus on combinations – two and three colors in foliage or clusters of fruit – and growth habits that expand ornamental peppers' uses in the garden.

The point of the product is to provide fiery color to the plant palette, not the palate; the new peppers are incendiary, even to a Tex-Mex-adjusted tongue. Rely on them, instead, to fire up containers and flower borders with reds, oranges and yellows. The dark-leaved versions provide a sophisticated contrast to blooming plants that provide color through the fall until frost, especially violet (asters), orange (calendulas), yellow (mums) and white (African daisies).

Jimmy Turner

'Its peppers look like tiny Dr. Seuss Christmas lights,' the Dallas Arboretum's Jimmy Turner says about 'Garda Tricolor'.

Jimmy Turner at the Dallas Arboretum has big plans for pepper plants in the garden's displays.

"I like peppers," he says. "I like them in hanging baskets and in whiskey barrels. They do great massed alone, or try mixing them with crotons or sweet potato vines. One of my favorite combos in a pot is with 'Black Seeded Simpson' lettuce growing around them – ornamental and edible."

When pumpkins become available at grocers and farmers' markets in autumn, Mr. Turner offers another decorative use.

"Set a large pumpkin in a container and plant peppers around it. The pumpkin costs less than a mum and usually lasts longer," he says. "Marigolds are still one of my favorite fall flowers. Cheap, easy to grow and blooms until first frost."

Look for pepper varieties that have a spreading or weeping habit. They should offer fresh material for combinations in hanging baskets, not a use associated with ornamental peppers.

At the arboretum's trial gardens this year, high scorers include 'Trifetti' (mottled purple, white and green foliage), 'Garda Tricolor' ("Its peppers look like tiny Dr. Seuss Christmas lights.") and 'Black Pearl', which was named an All-America Selections winner.

Ball Seed, the company that released 'Black Pearl', is introducing three more brightly colored ornamentals – 'Calico', 'Purple Flash' and 'Sangria' – that will be available nationwide next spring. Some wholesale growers have been testing the plants this summer, however, and Calloway's has snagged inventory for North Texas consumers. The retailer expects to have plants available this weekend.

Norman Winter/MSU Extension Service

Calloway's has a limited supply of 'Calico' and other new Ball peppers that will be available nationwide next spring.

Most retailers, including Nicholson-Hardie and North Haven Gardens, will have various ornamental peppers in stock for fall.

If you have a summer container that needs refreshing, a dead spot in the front of the shade border or just want to go plant shopping for something different to see you through until frost, I nominate Thai Delights caladiums.

Introduced on a limited scale to consumer gardeners this summer, the so-called Thai hybrids, in production by several growers, have thicker leaves and different color combinations than the fancy-leaf and strap-leaf varieties we're accustomed to growing in North Texas. Their leaf texture reminds me of sweet fruit leathers, and the colors are deep, dramatic and almost iridescent.

North Haven Gardens in Dallas has a fresh supply of Hines Horticulture's introductions. The crop experienced delays, so they were not for sale when other caladiums reached store shelves in late spring. Available in two sizes at press time, Thai Delights cost $5.99 and $12.99 a container.