March Sprouts

Springtime is the land awakening. The March winds are the morning yawn. ~Quoted by Lewis Grizzard in Kathy Sue Loudermilk, I Love You

The Stella D'Ora seeds are srpouting at least some of them. I know it's easier to divide, however, I wanted to try this little project of mine. These won't produce any flowers for 2 years. My next project will go underway this summer where I will be trying hybridizing daylily's.

Warm weather has finally arrived here in Indiana this week, some signs that our spring flowers are enjoying it as well.

Tulip

Daffodil

Tiger Lily

Daylily Seeds

My green thumb came only as a result of the mistakes I made while learning to see things from the plant's point of view. ~H. Fred Ale

Last fall I collected some daylily seeds from some Stella O'dora plants at work. I planted some and well........ I forgot about the others. I had the seeds tucked away in my frig and found them. The seeds were inside a ziplock bag and most all of them had roots!?

This is something very new to me so we shall see if nature will surprise me. The above picture you see a little sprout. So if even one of them survives I will be elated.

Propagating Daylily

'JESSICA LILIAN DAYLILY'

Starting daylily's from seed is new for me. I have collected a lot of seed from the huge amount of Stella De Oro daylily's where I work.

Below are pictures of where I planted the seeds along the border where this year the alyssum didn't do so well. I think it will be a pretty, we will see and I will keep my fingers crossed. There are different ways to propagate daylily's. I wanted to try my hand at seed and let nature takes it's course.


I plan on starting some of the seed indoors as well (just in case nature doesn't want to cooperate)

Back to the grind

This is the scene outside my window at work. Of course this picture was taken a week ago and now the tulip blooms are gone.


I've been on a vacation of sorts. Didn't even turn on my computer last week!


I've been planting, planting and more planting, and a little shopping here and there. (probably too much $$ spent) ah well so it goes.



My marigolds, cosmos and nasturtium's that I direct sowed outdoors are sprouting. The plants I started indoors, well let's just say it was a 50/50 survival rate on those, the sweetpeas did the best.


I took several cuttings from my lavender plant last week, so I'm hoping they will root. I dipped the cutting in root hormone and put them in a pot of clean play sand that is moist but not wet. Hopefully I will get some new plants out of some of them.


I took several pictures last week, but have not loaded them onto the computer. I'm still in lazy mode right now and not feeling very creative today.



Hope all is well in your garden!!!!

The Rose Bed

One of the most delightful things about a garden is the anticipation it provides. ~W.E. Johns, The Passing Show



The not very good picture to the left (I desperately need a new camera, trust me it's not just me) is one of my roses from 2007.

I am creating this area to be a rose garden as I mentioned in my previous post. There are three roses I planted last year and of course I failed to keep record of their names on all but one of them. Altissimo Rose is one, and this will be it's first year to bloom (hopefully). It looks good so far this year and the little guy is starting to branch out. It's a climber and I love all things climby (is that a word?).

But anyway, here is a photo of Rose Altissimo that I found on photobucket.

Pretty huh?

The following roses to be planted here are:

Abraham Darby
Pat Austin

Crocus Rose

LD Braithwaite

As you may have noticed all of these are David Austin roses, they are my favorite . I will probably add more roses at a later date. I want to add some unique roses sometime in the future. I'm still working on this bed and will be adding some perennials. Yesterday I sowed some cosmos seed in between two of the rose's. I received the seed from a gardening magazine, so we will see if they take.

I can't wait to see them bloom! Don't you just love it!

Mystery Plant

My green thumb came only as a result of the mistakes I made while learning to see things from the plant's point of view. ~H. Fred Ale

I started my seeds too early this year. Sweet pea, morning glory, nasturtium and alyssum need to be planted soon. African daisy and some different types of viola are still growing or germinating.

I've had bad luck with the nasturtium, maybe too much water? too rich of soil? These flowers like dry, poor soil. I have some seeds left that I will sow directly outdoors along with some sunflowers, marigolds and see if they do better. I imagine they probably will.

The caladium are starting to sprout. I have one that has a leaf getting ready to unfurl. I think these will be ready to plant outdoors by the time Indiana's last frost date (May 10).

My daughter (7 years) has a little garden of her own, so of course she wanted to start seeds as well. On her own she rummaged through the garage to find some pots and filled it with potting soil and planted some seeds I had. I have no idea what she planted, I have, or should I say had, several seed packets and can't remember what they all were. So we have some mystery plants. This may be interesting. Her favorite color is blue and every year she plants some blue flowers or plants in her garden. So if I were to guess I would bet this is something blue.

I guess we will have to wait and see.

Bring on SPRING

Sunflower I planted last summer **** sigh****

February in Indiana is most un-predictable that it's predictable (if that makes sense). It's predictable in the way as to one day it's 50 degrees and the next it is 20 degrees. In my previous post I mentioned planning my garden, so that's what I have been up to this past month as I patiently (sarcasm) wait for warm weather maybe if I'm ambitious I'll add some new landscaping. I keep going over it in my mind and drawing it on paper, and of course keep changing it.

I have already started some sweet peas, morning glories and I'd have more flowers started if I could make up my mind on which plants I want where. Of course I will have some more sunflowers but I sow those directly outdoors in late spring or early
summer.

I ordered daylilly ’Stella de Oro’ for the border in front of my rose garden the other day from "Classy Groundcovers" I have never purchased anything from them, but they were highly recommended on Dave's Garden website. If you ever buy from catalogs or online stores for gardening supplies or plants, I would recommend checking out Dave's site. Recommendations come from real gardeners whom have purchased from these companies.

Tonight we are expecting more snow AND ice! I guess I will be stuck indoors for the weekend. But, there are always plant and gardening catalogs to thumb through. Maybe I'll find something unique to add to my garden this year.