Re: Gardens 2026
Posted: Thu Jun 18, 2026 12:08 pm
Kittykatt, you have a slice of loveliness there. I could just stare, lol. Do you sit there often? The little table is inviting - I would probably be messily planting up seedlings there and keeping it from being pretty!
Nancy, your "Four Colors" of hollyhocks is such a sweet visual. Love yellows, but those reds are way healthy. So sorry about the fires sending smoke your way.
Mystery Woman had asked about whether I'd tell what I bought this past weekend at my last straggling trip to purchase for summer plantings. I almost forget to get in here and do it.
So, this long post is Mystery's fault.
She gave me permission, lol.
This is a bitsy-shopping-trips, annuals year for me, since I wasn't supposed to work in the dirt growing my own of anything this past winter/spring.
I specifically shopped the orphan annuals at the Home Depot garden center. (Kittykatt, HD is a big-box home improvement store you may or may not have even heard of. I usually call it "Home Despot" since folks around here tease with that name.) In recent years, the home improvement places have dabbled in more of the hybridized, "name" flowers.
I found four:
another Reiger yellow Begonia, no name
Hoopla Vivid Orchid Petunia
Mini-Vista Cool Jazz Petunia
and a yellow French Marigold
Only the Reiger had one sister left - the rest were true orphans. But only the Marigold looked straggly in any way, and it has perked up here with some attention. It was $1.80 in its own pot and very "forgettable", really - I was soft-hearted because it will keep away some bad bugs and give some yellow if my other low yellow flowers like petunias don't thrive much longer. The others, since they were from "name" houses, were $5.00.
Sad to say, the more orange/mahogony bi-colored of the Marigold crowd, the "Spry" or "Harmony" colorations, were not picked over at all - maybe that means those are the ones that will really be wasted this year. They don't shine out with bright color like the yellows, so maybe they are ignored, even though healthy. It is true that visitors to my garden wouldn't notice them if I didn't put them at certain trafficked places, especially without sun on them at the moment. Still, high on my list of seed planting for next year would be Marigolds in the Spry coloring.
Bringing the LABELED Hoopla home to my garden showed me that there is a difference between it and the one I bought at the really nice nursery at a slightly higher price, but didn't realize it wasn't (maybe?) the real variety. Side by side, without a doubt this labeled Hoopla Vivid is nowhere near as vivid as the one already in my garden. So, what's up with that? I'm pretty sure just being in my garden doesn't make the color better???? Is it possible that the less expensive outlets are getting labeled plants, but sort of "seconds"?
The Cool Jazz is the first I've had of this color, so I assume it's the right shade. The point of a color like this, which I do have in my new-to-me New Zealand Sunpatien, is that it is so light it catches attention in the way a white would, yet it's a purple. When the sunshine leaves it for the day, I've noticed it draws the eye anyway, while other purples tend to disappear.
I had mentioned I was worried about the Saffron Finch, the yellow Petunia. It rallied, and at one point had as many as 20 blooms per plant with no difference between plants in two different locations in my garden. But now, getting spindly rather early in the season. It occurs to me I could give it a haircut and see if that helps. I've heard that, sadly, some nurseries are deciding they can't offer this one any more because it's not reliable. A new one for next year, called "New Bee", is one I'll watch for, because it seems to have better habit. I doubt I'll bother growing petunias from seed - the strong ones are hybrids anyway.
The one SuperCal petunia (why didn't I get more?) has giant blooms and is taking over its wide pot. I should probably have planted it in the ground with others, but was thinking pot was best since I just had the one. It thinks it's two or three. And by now, my garden is a lot less structured than usual anyway, I'll call it "eclectic", lol.
Nancy, your "Four Colors" of hollyhocks is such a sweet visual. Love yellows, but those reds are way healthy. So sorry about the fires sending smoke your way.
Mystery Woman had asked about whether I'd tell what I bought this past weekend at my last straggling trip to purchase for summer plantings. I almost forget to get in here and do it.
So, this long post is Mystery's fault.
She gave me permission, lol.This is a bitsy-shopping-trips, annuals year for me, since I wasn't supposed to work in the dirt growing my own of anything this past winter/spring.
I specifically shopped the orphan annuals at the Home Depot garden center. (Kittykatt, HD is a big-box home improvement store you may or may not have even heard of. I usually call it "Home Despot" since folks around here tease with that name.) In recent years, the home improvement places have dabbled in more of the hybridized, "name" flowers.
I found four:
another Reiger yellow Begonia, no name
Hoopla Vivid Orchid Petunia
Mini-Vista Cool Jazz Petunia
and a yellow French Marigold
Only the Reiger had one sister left - the rest were true orphans. But only the Marigold looked straggly in any way, and it has perked up here with some attention. It was $1.80 in its own pot and very "forgettable", really - I was soft-hearted because it will keep away some bad bugs and give some yellow if my other low yellow flowers like petunias don't thrive much longer. The others, since they were from "name" houses, were $5.00.
Sad to say, the more orange/mahogony bi-colored of the Marigold crowd, the "Spry" or "Harmony" colorations, were not picked over at all - maybe that means those are the ones that will really be wasted this year. They don't shine out with bright color like the yellows, so maybe they are ignored, even though healthy. It is true that visitors to my garden wouldn't notice them if I didn't put them at certain trafficked places, especially without sun on them at the moment. Still, high on my list of seed planting for next year would be Marigolds in the Spry coloring.
Bringing the LABELED Hoopla home to my garden showed me that there is a difference between it and the one I bought at the really nice nursery at a slightly higher price, but didn't realize it wasn't (maybe?) the real variety. Side by side, without a doubt this labeled Hoopla Vivid is nowhere near as vivid as the one already in my garden. So, what's up with that? I'm pretty sure just being in my garden doesn't make the color better???? Is it possible that the less expensive outlets are getting labeled plants, but sort of "seconds"?
The Cool Jazz is the first I've had of this color, so I assume it's the right shade. The point of a color like this, which I do have in my new-to-me New Zealand Sunpatien, is that it is so light it catches attention in the way a white would, yet it's a purple. When the sunshine leaves it for the day, I've noticed it draws the eye anyway, while other purples tend to disappear.
I had mentioned I was worried about the Saffron Finch, the yellow Petunia. It rallied, and at one point had as many as 20 blooms per plant with no difference between plants in two different locations in my garden. But now, getting spindly rather early in the season. It occurs to me I could give it a haircut and see if that helps. I've heard that, sadly, some nurseries are deciding they can't offer this one any more because it's not reliable. A new one for next year, called "New Bee", is one I'll watch for, because it seems to have better habit. I doubt I'll bother growing petunias from seed - the strong ones are hybrids anyway.
The one SuperCal petunia (why didn't I get more?) has giant blooms and is taking over its wide pot. I should probably have planted it in the ground with others, but was thinking pot was best since I just had the one. It thinks it's two or three. And by now, my garden is a lot less structured than usual anyway, I'll call it "eclectic", lol.