I don't know where you live, but in Colorado or nearby states, www.waterplants.com would be a great choice. the aquatic plant farm is near Sugar City, 20 minutes east of Pueblo. I actually visited the farm and received first-hand expert advice from Victor Plawski, the owner. I viewed a multitude of waterlilys of all different types and picked out the most prolific tropicals and hardies. Now I have lilies in my pond that have enormous pads and blooms everywhere; I even had some mailed to me and they are doing great also. I bought all kinds of marginals for my bog filter and they are doing great too. It gives me confidence to buy plants from zone 5, rather than some tropical state down south. I bought one unlabeled waterlily from Lowe's. It is doing fine, but it turned out to be a dwarf yellow bloom hardy called "helvola". I think that Lowe's must be selling dwarf varieties because of their small preformed ponds. The prices at waterplants.com are much lower than the local pond stores and the plants are as good as they get. My best tropical lilies are Star of Zanzibar and Star of Siam. My best Hardies are "Colorado" and "Mangkola Ubol" (an Asian variety). They are doing especially great with the water temperatures in Colorado Springs, CO. I get only 6 hours of full sun a day until the pond gets shaded by houses. My tropicals will not survive the winter, but I will buy new ones in the spring. They are well worth the price to consider them as annuals. They send up 5 times as many blooms as a hardy and the pads are over 1 foot in diameter; covering an area at least 6' across.

Thanks, everybody, for your comments. I ended up emailing Sophie Hodorowicz Knab, who writes for the Buffalo-based Polish-American Journal, and is the author of a fascinating little book called Polish Herbs, Flowers & Folk Medicine. Much to my delight, she responded to my inquiry. Here's what she had to say: Hi Cecilia! Thak you for owning my book! I appreciate the support. My book on herbs was not all inclusive as a publisher imposes page limitations but I looked up komosa on a Polish website and indeed, it exists and very likely what you are looking for. If you keep scrolling down on the website you will see that there are two types of komosa: komosa biala(chenopodium album) and komosa strzalkowa (chenopodium bonus-henricus). The leaves of both are edible and native to Europe. The people of Poland foraged the land and were expert at finding herbs and plants to eat especially during times of famine and hardship. It's wonderful that you have this wonderful memory of your family. Plant it in your garden as a memory to your family and heritage. Best of luck to you. Sophie Hodorowicz Knab Here is a link that might be useful: Polish plant website showing Komosa

Hi! I notice most of this thread is 9 years old and i wonder if you folks are still here, reading this discussion makes me happy. I was researching if i could transplant iris, black eyed Susan, bergamot, and coneflowers into my damp sunny front yard violet patch and expect them to thrive, and I'm going to try it! @Hu of 5 months ago, that would be really pretty, columbine with violets. IDK if it would work but I will try it too after the hardy stuff establishes! My goal is to make a privacy screen so I feel less exposed in my front yard. I want it dense with always something blooming. Right now I have a big forsythia on one end, hollies on the other, and a 100yo rose bush in the middle. I want to be able to put a hammock between the apple trees without my neighbors leering at me. Zone 6 NE KY!

I think the idea of a SE MA swap is great, too and I appreciate how far our SE friends have been traveling. I hope, however, that we continue to have two swaps- Sp and F- and that one will be "up here" around Boston, AND that our Cape area friends will come this way, despite the drive! Can you see I'm feeling a bit anxious about the group (as fluid as it is) hanging in together? Rationally, my anxiety makes little sense because the reason people come or don't are so varied but even so, sometimes thinking about change is difficult. But I'll be there, no matter what, if I can get there!