JG and ZM, Y'all are some fabulous zinnia buddies! I can't say how much I appreciate the dedication to the species. My 'Red Spider' of 2008 matched the one in Jackier's photo except mine's flowers were consistently 13 petaled. I attempted to move some Z. violacea pollen onto the Z. tenuifolia, but their anatomies seemed so different, I couldn't really imagine any success. The Peruvian in Jackier's photo looks anatomically similar enough to Z. haageana for me to imagine success. My idea to set up that cross came from the fact that Z. peruviana, Z. haageana, and Z. violacea comprise one zinnia subgenus. Thanks for the link to Southern Exposure. I can't say that I've ever been in a website so difficult to navigate (flowers not being alphabetized and ordering a catalogue a circular process leading nowhere). Still, I intend to order some of the Peruvians. One thing I didn't understand is that the number of seeds in 1/2 gram is very different for the red and the yellow. I would think that if the only difference were color, the number of seed per unit should be almost the same.

I've gotta tell you about our 1922 beach cottage made of spit and bubblegum. PO's? There must have been a PO for every year of the house's life. It seems that we are the first owners who planned to stay a while, without renting it out. It has gorgeous views, a beautiful beach and is in a very desirable second home and rental home beach community. So po's buy it, rent it for big bucks, never put a dime into it, and sell it-they then buy their 'real' second home. It was the cheapest, shabbiest, and only affordable house on Lake Shore Drive, so we bought it. 1. It's on a dune, and still sits on a two foot tall iffy crawl space. The walls of the foundation have holes. We found brand new boxes of floor jacks (to hold up the floors) in the crawl sp. Pre-sale, the inspector could not inspect the contents of the crawl because it was jammed with 80 years of stuff, deliberately. 2. Crawl contains the plenum (thingy which distributes heat and a/c to the various rooms), lying on its side and connected to the furnace in the first floor util room. Two of the four second floor bedrooms are unheated and un a/c'ed because the plenum is too far from the rooms. There are no chases, no ducts going to these bedrooms. I'm afraid room air conditioners will blow the knob and tube upstairs wiring. 3. There is no real drywall or plaster, just wallpaper smoothed out over paneling. Only thin paneling over random studs. 4. The floor under the second floor toilet was rotted, a common occurence I've been told. The metal linen cabinets in the solo upstairs bath were rusted, dented, disgusting. The shower was uh, kind of blue and rust colored. It was worse than fourth world countries' bathroom facilities. We gutted to the random studs, searched for elec in the most unexpected places, and remodeled into a beautiful room. 5. Bedrooms measured 7X9, 8X9, 9X9 and the master is 9X15 with a sloped ceiling, from 6.5' to 7' high. No upstairs ceiling is taller than 6.5'+. Painted paneling with many, many holes. Had to remove closet doors:they were gerryrigged and never fit. 6. Oh, yes, the popcorn ceiling panels collapsed in two bedrooms. Fixed it once and after the second collapse, we installed new drywall ceilings upstairs. 7. Instead of having regular can ceiling lights in the bedrooms, they had shower lights, which gave off, oh, 10 watts of dim. 8. The walls bow a bit, here and there. 9. The floors have holes but I covered every square inch with inexpensive laminate which looks great and has a few bouncy spots. A marble rolls on the floor from one end of the house to the other in a split second! 10. We have fixed most of the major things and it is now a cute cottage, but The afterthought utility room which holds the furnace, some water pipes and the water heater has a 13" wide door. However, the diameter of the water heater is 18". This may be the year when we create a new door from the wall of the util room to the outside of the house, to replace the water heater, whenever, not if. Still, 6 years later, some money, lots of effort, it's delightful and in great demand by family and friends. Oh, btw, dh and I went there for N.Y. Eve and a big snowstorm hit and we had to evacuate quickly, because, among other reasons, the only way to get down and out, would be like sliding down an olympic luge, aka known as high flights of stairs, unevenly spaced stairs. We went to the casino hotel and had a great time! Bev

Hi Four, This is an older message thread (Part 47, while Part 51 is current) but I will respond anyway. Yes, in your B photo, the pollen florets are maturing and setting seeds and they probably no longer have nectar for butterflies, so you could could remove that bloom if feeding butterflies is your primary motivation. In your C photo it isn't crucial where on the stem you make the cut.. I would cut down lower on the stem because there isn't any significant advantage to leaving a lot of bare stem on your plant. If you want to make further comments, it would be better to add them to Part 51, which has only 21 comments, while this Part 47 now has well over 100 comments. ZM

Hello four, " "Modified", that is. Do they have nectar? " Some of them have nectar, the ones I have observed with butterflies, skippers, bees, or day-flying moths feeding on them. I have no way of knowing whether my indoor specimens have nectar or not. I think they probably do have nectar. Just no butterflies to confirm that. " If the florets have a reasonable amount of nectar, then the volume of nectar in that one flower would be a butterflies' bonanza. " I have taken a few tubular zinnia petals apart, and the amount of nectar I find in each petal is relatively small. I would not describe it as a drop, but something more like a "micro-drop". Zinnias always attract a bunch of butterflies and such, but I think there are probably other flowers that have more volume of nectar. I am of the opinion that you have to be careful what you wish for. I still remember that freakish zinnia bloom that had so much nectar, and the tiny ants that were attracted to it in such scary numbers. ZM