I am a commercial grower, and I've grown both the vegetative and seed-produced petunias. Myself, I prefer the seed grown. Yes, Surfinias are beautiful, but so are the seed grown, if cared for properly. Yes, the waves have thinner stems, but I've found that is a plus, not a minus. I've had baskets of vegetative petunias where the stems snap and break easily when bumped or windblown, losing whole hunks from the canopy. Perhaps some varieties of Surfinia are heat tolerant, but I was just reading some University of Florida trials and one note on the Surfinia Patio Chiffon rated it poorly for heat tolerance. Waves are not the only 'spreading' petunia grown from seed. Rambin' is another brand, and there are others. The varietal range is great, and getting better every year. You can get seed grown spreading petunias in an amazing selection now. White, yellow, dark blue, purple, pink, those with white throats. Large flowered, small flowered, short like the shock waves. Waves don't need deadheaded, but they will branch a lot more abundantly if you nip off the central leader and whack them back occasionally. Being seed-grown means I worry a lot less about diseases, because they don't have to be virus cultured. Seed grown petunias should also be cheaper to buy both for the grower and the end user. No, a vegeative petunia is normally cutting produced, not tissue cultured, but could be. I wonder if buying Surfinias on Ebay you can be sure the royalties are paid, since they are patented.

I have joe pye weed seed and strawberry plants also buddlia davidi butterfly bush .i am very much wanting turks cap and the mexican petunia seeds sound wonderful i would be grateful! Donna Frost 52 sunshine way monticello ky 42633. God bless!

How weird. I was just looking up information about petunias in Florida, what seasons they're good for and such and then I come back to GW and find a topic on them. My experience with petunias is limited, but I had some in a terracotta pot last spring/summer that seemed to do okay. By July they were definitely showing signs of heat stress, but regular feedings of MG's All-Purpose Water-Soluble fertilizer kept them alive. At the time I was still very new to this whole gardening thing and so 'regular' for me was like every other day they were getting a dose. This constant feeding is probably what kept them from dying off and is probably why I did not see what you're describing. At the current time, I have about 6 petunias planted around the base of my Knock-Out Rose and they seem to be doing okay so far. They get a fair bit more sun than what you describe though. They get near constant sun from sunrise until 4 pm with a very short break around 10:30 as they fall into the shadow of a nearby bush for about 20-30 minutes,then they're back in the baking sun. My biggest problem with these things is the near-constant need to dead-head them. I like working in my yard, but I don't like having to constantly fawn over one particular plant to keep it going (which is why I'm also not all that keen on having roses [the Knock-Outs were a gift]). These don't get fed nearly as much as the potted ones from last year, just a dose of Fish Fertilizer every two weeks or so, which is more for the roses than the petunias, but the petunias get the benefit. Aside from that there's not much special about where they're planted. It's native soil (sand) mixed with a bag of Black Kow and topped off with Pine Fines as mulch. All that said, I will not be actively looking to purchase petunias again for myself. The ones I have now were actually given to me by my mother who had purchased too many for her planters. However, I do intend to purchase and sprout seeds since my mom is a pretty big fan of them. Hence my internet search, I was trying to figure out when to sow seeds to have them ready for her next planter arrangement. And here they are:

I LOVE my Mexican petunias. We just planted 32 plants in a 44 ft. long x 6 ft wide front flower bed. They are pale pink and purple (planted to alternate color) and are growing so beautiful. NEVER would I pull mine up either . . . they bloom so prolifically and full, and it has made such an awsome, full-of-bloom and colorful flower bed on that one front side of our home (we have a long ranch style home on two acres). We plan to put them all around the house eventually. They are hardy and although we water them regularly, need not much more attention.