Any blooms yet on your WS seedlings?

I'm totally psyched about the blue honeywort (the pic doesn't do it justice)! I will always have a place for them in my garden from now on. Tamara

And I'm really liking these larkspur as well, which is another plant I've never grown. Sorry for the blurry pic...I really need a good camera!

These dianthus were sown last year, and bloomed this year:

Tamara,

I notice you are also zone 5. Are the Larkspur and Blue Honeywort both perennials for you? Would you keep some seed for me? I will have many seeds this fall and I think we are planning a fun seed swap :)

I should have some very pretty and easy to winter sow seeds this fall of some fun plants :)

Kim

This is my first time growing both of them, so I'm not sure whether they will come back. I'm pretty sure honeywort is a self-sowing annual, so it acts like a perennial in that way. Sure, I can save seeds from both. I love doing seed swaps! :-) Will the swap be posted here or on the seed exchange forum? Tamara

Well, this is my thoughts and anyone is welcome to pipe in here.

I would like to post the swap in the Northeast forum as we seem to be mostly zone 5 or 6 and I'm sure we are all looking for seeds hardy in these zones and not Florida *lol*.

I would be willing to host a seed swap this fall.
I'm thinking to limiting it to 20 people though as this can get VERY confusing. I need to put some thought into it and develop a plan of action but I know it will be alot of fun that's for sure :)
If someone else has hosted a seed swap and would like to volunteer for this one, please let me know. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

I will post a new thread in early fall (seed collecting time) in the Northeast Forum for those that may be interest.

I'm thinking little baggies of 20 seeds each, 5-10 different perennials (or as many as you can spare) etc.

I will start a thread on the Northest Forum shortly so we can all discuss it.

I just don't want to hi-jack this thread.

Kim

Sounds great to me, Kim - by then I can collect some seeds to share :-)

Posted the Seed Swap Signup and rules on the Northeast Forum for those that are interested.
Hope to see you all there :)

Kim

Kim - I'm hosting a swap at the moment and plan on doing another in the fall like I did last year. You are welcomed to join that one or host one of your own.

Here are some pics of my blooms..This is Malva Silver Cup

Here's an annual larkspur -'Blue Cloud'

I have my first bloom on the Black Eyed Susan Vine

Tamara: I love your wintersown blooms! Your Dianthus are beautiful!

Anita:Gorgeous pictures! I think I'm in love with Malva, 'Silver Cup'!

me too!

Anita,

I would LOVE to join yours instead of trying to have my own. It's hard when there are 2 going on.
Seandor, do you see this?
Anita, do you have the rules etc. up yet because if you did, I didn't see them.
I have never done a Seed Swap before and thought it would be fun but if you've done it before than I am all into joining yours :)
I have a few perennials that I know will make seeds and some that already are but I would really like to find some new perennials and I know there are alot out there that I don't have yet.
Anita, you are welcome to use any information in my post that you need should you like to.

Thank you so much,
Kim

Yep I see it. :-) I do like the rules that Kim had - let's have perennial seeds that work in the north or very hardy annuals so we can actually see blossoms this year before the annuals croak :-) Baby's breath, bachelor buttons, and linaria worked for me.

If you divided a map of the US in fourths, Indiana would qualify as northeast )))

Suzy

I'm way behind on checking posts. Really enjoy seeing everyone's flowers.

Shirley: Your larkspur gentian blue look purple on my monitor. Are they blue or purple? Mine are a real electric blue. Here's a photo of mine, taken today

Karen

OMG Karen, those are BEAUTIFUL!

Kim

Thanks, Kim. I love 'em.

Karen

I didn't limit the zones in the past two, but I could on the fall swap. Just zones 7 and below? Would that work or should I limit it to zones 6-3?

I'm in either way and don't want to hurt any feelings but being in Maine my vote would be zones 6 and below. But I'm game either way. Anything that grows in my garden will certainly make it in zone 7. However seeds coming from zone 7 would NEVER make it in my garden :(
We are so much later than everyone else which makes it quite difficult for me. Everyone already has their seeds gathered and mine are still blooming and can't be harvested :(

Kim

Remember - this would be the fall swap. The current one is basically closed already.

Perfect....Anita, did you happen to read my post at all? Do you have a date in mind for the fall one?

Kim

Just commenting regard to zone considerations... people in warmer zones could still participate, as long as they only sent hardier varieties of seed for the swap, right? As was pointed out, anything that will grow in zone 6 will grow in zone 7... and a lot of things that grow in zone 7 gardens will also grow just fine in zone 4... I guess to be really certain, you could limit participants to people in cooler zones, but it's pretty straightforward to look up seeds in PF and just not send any you're not sure of. Do you have a minimal hardiness in mind? Do the plants have to be hardy to at least zone 6, or hardy to at least zone 4, or ?

Karen I had to smile looking at your beautiful flower bed as it looks just like mine. Not the same flowers mind you, but the bright green ring of grass that surrounds it....and the brown that lies beyond ithat. Man oh man are we ever going to get any rain? I'm pumping water to those poor parched babies around the clock.

Me, too Jane, watering around the clock. I bought a timer yesterday for the hose so that I can run a sprinkler while I'm at work.

Re: the lawn, my husband "mowed the lawn" Sunday by just running the mower around each bed. Took about 10 minutes and he was finished.

The weather man pretty much promised rain yesterday. When it didn't materialize my friend feared that I might be heading to channel 9 with a gun to shoot the weather guy. Our last rain (i.e. lasting more than a minute) was on May 15.

Karen

I would love to participate in the Fall swap, I'm not in the Northeast, but I've got W/Sing buddies from the NE and I'm in zone 5! ;0)

Jill - I think you are fine - what ever grows in your yard. In general, it is hard to control what comes in and in turn, what goes out. Obviously, zone 9-10 items just wouldn't cut it in our yards. Kim - yes, I read your post - I would run the swap in November. By that time most of our plants will have gone to seed. But, we can cross that bridge at the end of the summer as I'm sure no one has any idea what seeds they will have and what quantity. The swap I had was basically for left over seed from this years sowing - remember - seed doesn't go bad [at least after one year].

Bachelor Buttons waiting to find a home

Linaria - had no idea how beautiful they would be - These will always be part of my gardens! Picture is kind of fuzzy - sorry

I was surprised about those Linaria, too. I had never heard about them before, but I agree, I will always have them!

Yours are particularly nice, Seandor!

Suzy

Seandor, love the linaria. Never heard of it but sure looks pretty.
Your pictures have inspired me to not let another winter go by without winter sowing.
I tried it 2 years ago, my turn out wasn't wonderful and decided I wouldn't do it again. I didn't do it last year and now I wish I had *lol*.
I will definately be winter sowing this year :)

Kim

Here are some WSd flowers -- Not the lilies, but everything else. Well, not the ageratum, but you can hardly see it. I planted all these out when they had 2 leaves. They were TINY. TEENY TINY.

Suzy

Oh how pretty! Makes wintersowing all the worth while seeing all the different colors and textures. Just think of the money you saved not having to go and buy those bloomers this spring.

I've never heard of Linaria.. Gone to Plantfiles.

Yeah, but there are plusses and minuses to wintersowing. One is you can't really buy Calendula or Bachelor Buttons (or a host of other things like Agrostemma and Bunny Tails) at the garden center, even if you wanted to. BUT it was a solid 2 months planting out, and I doubt I'll ever have that kind of time again, so I'll not be wintersowing next year except a few jugs (famous last words?) I'm going to let everything reseed instead and spend about 1/4 the time weeding out the ones that come up in the wrong place.

Suzy

Suzy, my mistake was that I didn't plant them out when the plants were teensy - so you have flowers - and I am still waiting for many. Here is a picture of linaria - I would never know about these except pixie sent me the seeds to wintersow. :-) I intend to wintersow lots again - I have drifts of snapdragons, larkspur, delphiniums, poppies, bachelor buttons, baby's breath. I have carnations, and pinks, violas - so many plants I could never afford to buy. Lucky me - I have a whole terrace on my street I can fill with plants if I want!


Michaela

Once again, there are pros and cons...I think it takes a lot longer to plant the teeny tiny babies because you have to be so careful! I mean they are really, really small. You have to be so careful getting them out of the jug, much less planting them in the ground. You have to site them perfectly, and make sure they are watered right away. When I talk about siting them, I mean that you have to take into account their eventual size. I have an entire drift of electric blue perennial blue delphinium that was totally swallowed by Calendula never to be seen again.

The Linaria I had looked so good, but it flopped like crazy and is now hugging the ground (of course it's also nearly covered up by other things). I like it because it bloomed so early. Here is my photo of when it looked good. They were clump transplanted and this is 1/4 the jug. I was getting desperate to get them inthe ground and get my patio cleaned up. The photo was from May 17th.

Suzy

Oh Suzy those are pretty,

So Suzy, you think it's better to wait until the seedlings are bigger? My seedlings were small when I planted them (relative to what is available at the nursery) - but they had huge roots systems.

No, not better, just more time consuming. The plants you see in the photo -- Calendula, Bachelor Buttons, and Linaria, and Delphinium, too, are very, very cold hardy and I planted them very, very early. It was cold when I planted them. Then it got 80 degrees for 3 weeks, then it got down to 23-30° for a week, and they were all just fine. They didn't grow when it was that cold, but they didn't die, either. I think I reported I had 2 sets of true leaves, but I didn't on all of them. I had one set of true leaves....and on the Calendula, I might not have even had that (I have 4 kinds of Calendula and I forget which was which).

Thanks, Connie.

Suzy

This message was edited Jun 22, 2007 10:36 AM