I'm looking to get some rooted cuttings or small plant to attract hummingbirds. Have lots of fresh Hibiscus seeds (white flower-red at the center) to trade or I can pay for postage. Thank you. Natalia

Marcia, I have a place in the front of our house, a northeast-facing spot, that I'm going to try the fuchsia. It gets morning sun but afternoon shade. The fuchsia in the pot will go back to PA with me and I hope I can keep it alive and bring it south again in the fall. (I also bought a second honeysuckle for my PA garden!) I have mixed feelings about leaving here--the end of this month is our target date. (Our back door neighbor has promised to water some things for me if we have a dry spring/summer.) While I'll miss seeing how my Florida garden will grow (or not!) over the next couple of months, I'm anxious to see how the bad winter has treated my garden in PA. I'm sure the weeds are doing fine! We're planning to come back here for a few weeks this summer. That will give me a chance to see how the weeds are growing, tend to the garden, and we can make a few trips to the beach :-) Thanks to all of the Florida GW gardeners who have answered my questions and with their photos and suggestions have given me a list of plants I want to grow here. Marcia PA/FL

Christie - I have "Blanche Sandman" and didn't get chance to notice if they went to it or not. It was in an odd spot and not easy for me to see and I had so many other hummer plants out there that they were all over the different plants when not at the feeder. I have seen "Alabama Crimson" and "Magnifica" at nearby nurseries and they are similar-looking to "Blanche Sandman" as far as I could tell (aside from slight differences in color intensity - I think the Crimson was more reddish, the Magnifica more orangey, and my Blanche Sandman has more red/pink in it). In general, they go for just about any native or native cross honeysuckle. I also have a Mandarin honeysuckle and each year, they buzz around it waiting for it to bloom. LOL That one is a bright burnt orange & yellow, but the flowers have tubes that are longer than L. sempervirens and its popular cultivars.

I haven't heard of a white coral honeysuckle, so it will be interesting to hear if it continues with white blooms throughout the summer, and past this bloom season. I know that there's a yellow cultivar of Lonicera sempervirens ('John Clayton'- see link below), so it obviously does 'sport' away from the usual coral/orange-y colors. Hummingbirds will visit the Japanese honeysuckle, so I'm guessing they'll be okay with your mutant white flowers. I planted a 'Major Wheeler' and a 'Magnifica' last spring and they have yet to bloom, although they are vining... This spring I planted a species coral honeysuckle in between the other vines and it is outperforming the older cultivar plants and is ready to bloom already. By the time the hummers come back through here in late summer, I'm hoping all 3 plants will be blooming. Here is a link that might be useful: photo of 'John Clayton' honeysuckle