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Benary’s Giant Scarlet Zinnias in the Cut Flower Garden
In continuing to update the blog with photos of the multitudes of zinnias that I’m growing this year – we come to the Benary’s Giant Scarlet zinnias! I’ll be the first to admit that red flowers aren’t really my favorite. They can be really harsh looking in cut flower arrangements, and not many people seem to gravitate towards the bright red bouquets. However, the same cannot be said for the hummingbirds! The Benary’s Giant Scarlet zinnias were hands down the most prolific zinnias of the summer. I planted one pack of 100 seeds, and was continuously rewarded with HUGE blooms. Ironically, I had intentionally placed these plants in a location…
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Floret ‘Golden Hour’ Zinnia is a Beauty!
This year, I went absolutely bonkers planting zinnias. I bought so many different varieties of these easy to grow flowers that my friends and family were a little worried that I may need to join some kind of support group. My order on the floret website was no exception to my zinnia madness. In fact, I was so happy to have grabbed a pack of these hard-to-get ‘Golden Hour’ zinnias. I do quite a bit of searching around when I’m shopping for flower seeds online. Floret is the only website that I’ve seen these seeds offered. I’ve looked over several catalogs to see if, per chance, they went by a…
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First Success with ‘Sahara’ Rudbeckia Hirta Flowers
One of my favorite parts of the growing season is getting to add something new to the garden. In the past, I’ve had very limited success with rudbeckia. I’ve tried several perennial types, but have almost always been met with failure. It wasn’t until I started growing rudbeckia hirta types that I finally found some success with rudbeckias as annuals. This year, I grew a very pretty variety called Sahara rudbeckia. Searching for the plant online, I found pretty of glowing photos of the large daisy shaped blooms. The plant growing in my own yard definitely did not disappoint! In my experience, I often find that mixed seed packets are…
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Floret’s Unicorn Mix Zinnias – They’re Gorgeous!
This was the first season that I’d ever been able to afford making an order from Floret. The listings are so gorgeous, but a little on the pricey side. Naturally, I was grown to many of the different zinnia varieties. I wasn’t particularly “in love” with the Unicorn Mix zinnia, but I was really drawn to the fun name. Ugh! Look at that fly that sneaked his way into my photo! That’s so annoying. Anyway, you can see that the Unicorn Mix zinnias really do come in a wide variety of gorgeous colors – from really light pale pink to shades of green and orange. I’ve yet to encounter this…
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The Curious Case of Scabiosa Zinnias
Scabiosa flowered zinnias are beautiful. The first time I had ever seen a photo of them, I was automatically lured to their poofy looking crested blooms. Much like everything else on the internet, however, all that glitters is not gold. I’ve been growing these plants for about three seasons now – be ready to be disappointed. Over the years, I’ve only had one real success with scabiosa flowered zinnias. This happened when I grew Zinderella Lilac zinnias last year. A quick search here on the blog will show those lovely flowers. For the most part, these types of zinnias are incredibly unreliable. There has been tons of speculation about this,…
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Ageratum + Lavatera Cut Flower Arrangement from the Garden
With the summer garden in full swing, I continue to find myself overwhelmed by everything that needs to be done. Specifically, this posts shows the wide assortment of blooms which appear as summer comes into full swing. To start this arrangement, I started with a bucket of ‘Timeless Mix’ ageratum flowers. I’ve grown several different varieties of ageratum in the past, but I definitely think that this one is one of my favorites. Rather than the standard blue or red, the mix also contains white and very pale pink blooms. Next, we have a flower that is a little more unique to my garden. I’ve grown lavatera flowers before, but…
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Trellising / Staking Zinnia Flowers in the Cut Flower Garden
As most of you already know, I had major issues getting the garden started this year. In fact, I’m still really struggling with motivation. However, I did manage to make it outside today to lay down some trellis netting on one of the zinnia beds. While I had originally planned to trellis all of the zinnias, I quickly found that I had inadvertently made most of the flower beds too wide. As you can see, I’m just using regular trellis netting. Most commonly, flower farmers use horti net for horizontal use. I already had this old stuff, so there was no sense in buying something new. This will be the…
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Staking / Trellising Dahlias Using a Weave
As I’m writing this, it is still HOT – like, “ain’t no way I’m going to out to weed” hot. Fortunately, I did force myself to go out and trellis the dahlias. Trellising and staking plants in my yard is always a major issue. Since my space is very limited, it always gets really hard to move around. This year, I’m attempting to use a weave between posts. To trellis my dahlia plants, I simply used hot pink mason’s twine to essential “sandwich” the plants between two tight lines. This way, I can still shimmy up and down the rows to pick flowers and take photos. Ideally, I should have…
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Zinnia Propagation: Rooting Zinnia Cuttings and Zinnia Stems in Water
My posts about zinnias are always some of the most popular ones on the blog. To me, it’s no surprise. Zinnias are so easy to grow AND they’re gorgeous. While there are several really pretty open pollinated varieties, seeds for some zinnia varieties can be pricey. It’s for this reason that I’ve found an interested in propagating zinnias from cuttings and rooting stems in water. Taking cuttings is really easy. All I do first, is make a cut below one of the leaf nodes. You can see in the picture above that I’ve carefully removed the very bottom set of leaves. While I’ve had quite a bit of success, it’s…
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Flower Arrangement: Statice and Daisies
