I bought the book
Winter Gardening for Beginners, suggested on Ace this weekend. It is a very fast read, fifteen minutes or so and not very helpful. Most of the suggestions are what to do to prepare for gardening in Spring, what to do to prepare in Fall and the like, not actual winter gardening, as in growing things in Winter, and that is what I was looking for. Nevertheless, the book did mention that polyanthus is a good winter flower, and I did not know what a polyanthus is so I looked it up. Turns out polyanthus is a hybrid primrose that does well in shade. They are usually a single color petal with contrasting center and they come in a very broad range of colors.
This is a new hybrid. The photos I looked at all originate in Britain. They are all the exact same photo, actually. None of the websites were helpful for finding seeds. One vendor sells polyanthus seeds on Amazon. They too have a very wide variety of colors but not the propellers variety. I wrote them inquiring and included a photo. They said they do not have it, but they are interested, check back. So I will. In the meantime I'll try to find seeds in Britain.
I love flowers that look like they're drawn by a cartoon artist, and these certainly do.
Is this outrageous, or what? I'm tempted to photoshop them spinning around.
5 comments:
That is a very stunning flower, good luck on finding seeds.
Do you have a collection of books about gardening in Colorado? Or wherever you are? That is where I've found the best advice for winter plants. But what exactly do mean by winter gardening? Do you want to try winter sowing outside? Or do you want to plant pansies? We plant them here in the foothills in October/November and they bloom almost all winter through until July heat kills them off. Up in Maryland they'd stop blooming during the coldest weeks of winter and then start up again and last until the weather becomes too hot.
My favorite winter blooming plant is the leatherleaf mahonia bush - glorious pale yellow sprays that bloomed in January in Maryland. The flowers pop in winter darkness against dark leaves as they capture ambient light from porches.
I took the book title at face value. I wanted to see what they said about growing things in winter. I expected winter hearty plants, like evergreens. I also expected other plants, vegetables and flowers that do okay inside, and how they would explain doing that.
I have my Aerogardens, and I do plant things in winter. I just wanted to see what they say.
I guess it was worth it. They did mention polyanthus and a few other things.
Polyanthus propeller variety animated.
Rudolph and Santa, animated gif
Chip, how do the Aerogardens work? Are they indoors all winter
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