Hi, I didn't check this page for a while - thanks for responding. In the meantime I called several fern growers but none has it, so will be glad keep in touch with you and trade a piece, if available. I grow many ferns and to me the key is always the soil and water. Hard to get a good composition to keep it moist but not soggy at the same time. Pure peat moss gets too soggy, I like to mix with very fine bark, perlite or pumice, if available. Micro-grow potting mix is OK but I would add a bit sand or fine bark and if the latter also a bit of clay. Bit of fine redwood bark keeps good structure over the time. Some osmocote while transplanting and water that isn't hard. Many ferns tolerate shade but grow the best having some direct (eastern) sun for a while, just so they don't get burned. Got two years ago tiger boston fern, very rewarding plant and nice fresh green. I am in CA next to Sacramento. Best!

Hi all, thank you so much for your feedback, and I am a she, not a he. :-) Hmm, I was thinking golden meadows also after looking at on-line images, but these hosta definitely do NOT turn all green as the summer progresses...could they be great expectations instead? I think they do need more sun; the one shown in my picture is the best looking one and gets the most dappled sunlight. The one at the end of the bed gets no sun and is just one sad little leaf sticking out of the ground. There are some nearby trees, but none of the dreaded life-sucking maples. My nearby Annabelle hydrangeas seem to do okay, but I did lose a couple of rhodendendron last year, so I just don't know! Thanks for the on-line resource, bkay! I'll definitely check that out. Ha ha, Ken, my son might be going to that green school in another year, either that or the maize and blue school...he can't decide, we still have to do the school tours. I've been to the umich gardens, but never to the state gardens...I'll have to check them out - thank you!

Meh, I don't know lol It may be a hybrid of mirabilis and retusa. It can even be a cross between different mirabilis varieties. What it isn't is cooperi. Mirabilis tend to have slight bumps (tubercles) on the surface and the back of the leaves. Those that do have smooth surfaces tend to not have hairs on the leaf margins. Retusas tend to be very smooth and dark green in the shade and red when grown in the sun, except the nigra variety which sometimes has tubercles. Neither has hairs on the leaf margins. Or, more likely, it came down so far from a variety of different species that it will be impossible to ID it for sure. The bottom line is that, there is no short cut to growing it for several seasons and seeing how it behaves when it isn't etiolated, over-watered or over-fertilized. Then narrow down the possibilities further by finding out whether it clumps or not; further down to what time of the year it blooms (early or late in the growing season?). Then, test what it looks like when it gets full sun vs what it looks like in the shade (different ssps, vars and/or affs behave differently under different light, water, nutrient, temperature conditions). Even then, you may only be able to guess the parentage (i'm fairly sure it's a hybrid and that still may be wrong). If it was from an open-pollinated plant, you'll have to guess what could also be blooming at the same time. Haworthias are annoying like that. I personally think identification based on morphology is a lost cause. If anyone ever gets to mapping these genes, I bet we'll all be shocked.

Thanks, everyone! I bet they are Little Lime, because the bushes only get to about 4-5 ft when they're full grown. I'm in southern Kentucky, about an hour north of Nashville, TN. Typically warm, but we've had some unusual late frosts (one happening tonight - I've been covering the bushes with sheets when the frosts happen). I'll hold on until the end of May to see if the 1.5 bushes have put out any leaves, and then I will try the scratch test. My husband keeps saying the whole bush without leaves is dead, and I'm just holding on hope that he isn't right! I think he is just saying that because of its lack of growth. It's received identical treatment and conditions to the other three. I'll take some pictures of the current state of each bush tomorrow.