The birds and i plant them .LOL I have had them for years,mostly the yellow and purple ones,and every year they surpris me and come up somewhere else,thanks to the birds and the wind.They've even shown up in my hanging pots.
Kathi

I would like some input on planting pansies and viola's for spring bloom, in my zone! I love these, but they don't reseed well for me. So I thought this year I would seed them. But I don't know WHEN to do it. And up here in the cold northland, WHEN is different than it is for you down there in the rest of the country. I am almost as far north as you can get and still be in the continental USA.

Jenny P

I planted some pansies and violas, the potted ones from the store, a few years ago, and have been getting seedlings ever since. They reseed like the dickens for me, and I pull up handfulls of them in the spring. They really like moist well draining environments. I think some of the individual plants will live about two, maybe three, years at a time. There generally short lived though. Ive never purposfully set out to sow them, but I imagine sowing the seed in early/mid fall would work well.
CMK

I have always associated pansies with spring. But the stores around here do put out a lot of pansies for sale in fall. This year I'm going to buy some! I assume they do well around here at that time of year, considering how many pansies the stores bring in.

I've never been a viola person. I don't do Johnnie Jump-Ups because I believe they are poisonous to dogs. But I do think they are cheery and pretty little flowers.

Lorna

Pansies like cooler weather, so it's Spring and Fall around here. Violas go through the hot summer.

I used to have johnny jump ups and am encouraging them to grow. I recscued a couple of violas from the lawn that look like yours, Nell.

And your title, pansies are for thoughts - I've never noticed this before but - I bought some of the 'ice pansies' this spring to get an early hit of colour. Of course, everything here is labelled bilingually, in English and French. en francais, they are pensees, which in english means to think.

Cheers, Nancy.

Oops, I was thinking pansies and petunias -- petunias go through summer : )

We can buy pansies and violas in March. Our last usual frost date is May 16. I just started growing them about 5 years ago. I don't think I've grown pansies in the ground, but have violas. I haven't had them reseed, but have on occasion had some over winter, I think in my egress window. They usually last the whole season, as I protect them from the west sun, but this week it looks like they are starting to struggle. This photo was taken the first week of July.
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I also have some mixed colors ones in two different wash tubs, but don't have them uploaded in my Webshots.
Sue

Lovely pic, Nell! I love violas of any variety and have them in all my beds. The johnny-jump-ups are my favs so I allow them to reseed any where they like. The larger pansy varieties reseed as well, but I usually end up moving them since they take up more room and get so big here. I still have a blue variety going strong under the 'Livin Easy' roses (orange). They generally die back in August when we warm up and stay that way for a few weeks, then they come back in Sept. and go all winter until the first snow. Some of them even stay around until spring when they look a bit ratty. I then give them a haircut and they're soon blooming again. So they are nearly year round bloomers for in my gardens.

Y'all know I love roses but I often think I could be quite content with just a huge bed of violas under the sycamore trees. : )

Diana

Act 4, Scene 5, of Shakespeare's Hamlet, Ophelia then says, "And there is pansies, that's for thoughts."
Ophelia hands out flowers, including Johnny Jump Ups, in front of the court with
the intent to say to the King and Queen what she thought and felt about her father's death.

The flowers she handed out have deep meaning and are in many gardens pictured here in Cottage Gardening.

Flowers are prominent in many of Shakespeare's works.
"Rosemary and rue: these keep
Seeming and savour all winter long
Grace and remembrance to you both."
The WinterÂs Tale (IV, iii)

"HereÂs flowers for you; hot lavender, mints, savory, marjoram." The WinterÂs Tale, Act IV, Scene 4.

The list goes on and on.
Does anybody here have a Shakespeare Garden?

Nell

Pansies are fall/winter flowers for me. I plant them in November and they last until May. Unless the heat arrives early! But, I have never tried to plant seeds before. I always buy flats. I think I'll try seeds this year.

Nell, when do they start to emerge for you? Are they reliable? I absolutely love pansies. One of my favorite flowers.

Love the picture of the violas next to the CA Poppies!

Marilyn

Marilyn, I planted the viola seed at the same time I planted the Iceland and CA poppies (the one in the photo was self-seeded), sometime in November, I think. They were blooming by March 1:

This year my plan is to plant viola seeds in cups in July, or August at the latest, even if I have to bring them inside where it's cooler, so they'll be ready to plant out at the optimal time, which I have written down somewhere, LOL. (Late October to Nov. 1). I may save a few seeds to plant in place in case my plan fails.

Nell

I like your plan, Nell! I plant my poppy seeds in November, too. I think I'll plant some viola seeds at the same time this year.

Again, very nice combination. Thanks for the idea!

Marilyn