In article ,
(paghat) writes:


In article ,
(DGiunti) wrote:

In article ,
arden (NAearthMOM) writes:

Please fill me in!


Love caryn

They were the first plant I grew from seed when I was a child. So
they could not really be hard to cultivate.

I suspect nasturtiums were the first I grew from seed, but sweetpeas were
either a close second or both during the same childhood year. In the late
1800s & before World War II, there were hundreds & hundreds of named
cultivars in all colors & they were quite the garden fad. Now the vast
majority of those varieties are extinct. The perennial ones are major
introduced weeds around here (puget sound) but pretty weeds at least.

-paghat the ratgirl

Have you looked around for some nasturtiums whose names you remember and not
found them? They are still quite popular flowers, though I do remember the
older neighbors telling me that there had been a fad on those things you are
growing there when I tried them. They were available in several different
colors in the 50s seed packets. They told me that the sweet peas had a similar
vogue even earlier in the 19th century too. The reason I selected that seed
packet was because they offered many different colored blooming varieties in
one packet. I knew that I would not be able to control the first generation
of seedlings color arrangement but there would be a lot of variety that would
be interesting. They were all the colors of the rainbow.

I don't remember if sweet peas are one of the flowers that need to have their
withering blossoms removed to continue flowering, like snap dragons? I think
they may be, but I am not sure?

I have met several self confessing nasturtium planters that enjoy planting
them on public land, just to give the spot a little color to enjoy the next
time they passed there. They were sort of guerilla gardeners. The nasturtiums
don't always perfectly naturalize because they like to have their seeds dry
out. If they stay too damp the seeds rot.

There are all sorts of guerilla gardeners though. One acquaintance plants
species that feed native butterflies. Many refer to these plants as weeds
however. My last garden was of her type. If you keep only the natives growing
that you knew support a butterfly species, you can get something other than
birds to hang out. I thought that when I started that garden that the place
would get over-run with caterpillars, but they have quite a few predators in
the wasp family the greatly reduced the butterfly productivity of the patch. I
usually had at least one hanging out. One of the native checker types uses the
same plant for all the stages of it's life. Leaves as a caterpillar and the
small red flowers that cover (oddly) the stems of the plant as an adult.

Dave

You should try and get a variety that does
well in your area. They do resent having their bed dry out too much
while they
are still in the sprout stage. Perhaps starting them in recycled annual
seedling trays would help because you could keep an eye on them.

But what sort of problems are you having with them? It's a bit early in
the
season to get them started outdoors if your area has a real winter.

--
"Of what are you afraid, my child?" inquired the kindly teacher.
"Oh, sir! The flowers, they are wild," replied the timid creature.
-from Peter Newell's "Wild Flowers"
See the Garden of Paghat the Ratgirl: http://www.paghat.com/



David Giunti email: unity
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