Giving a nursery-grown plant a bit of shade until it's established might mitigate the transplant shock. A lawn chair or laundry basket might provide dappled shade until the plant gets comfortable in its garden space. Watering with some sort of recycled container (milk, spring water or iced tea jug) will give it consistent moisture without scalding the leaves. Poke a pinhole with a push pin an inch from the bottom of the container, fill with water and set it close to the base of the plant. It's the poor gardener's irrigation system but it has kept my astilbes & hydrangeas alive during droughts these past many years. If the roots were circling the pot before you planted it, they might still be doing that in the ground if you didn't tease them loose before planting. Ask me how I know this can be an issue. According to my perennials book, these want full sun to part shade in fertile, moist but well-drained soil altho' it might be in your best interests to verify that 'Snow Lady' works in full sun for your zone. It's been my experience that thinking you can plant it/enjoy it/stroll-past-it & forget it is pretty much a myth when applied to perennial gardening. The highly-recommended & aptly named book by Tracy DiSabato-Aust 'The Well-Tended Perennial Garden' is a more realistic description of what we gardeners should keep in mind--gardening is a commitment to tend the things we sow if we expect them to thrive & perform as we envision.

CHERYL, in my experience almost any kind of spots on tulips or on their leaves is bad news! The flowers will look ok when you pick them in the early stages but by the time you are ready to set them out on the stand they will have broken out in spots on the flowers. Later, the tulips themselves will have little brown pits that spread into ugly spots. You might just as well pull them now. They don't recover over the winter! I don't know if it really helps any but we spray our cut tulips with a mild ammonia water in hopes that it will stop the fungal spores from developing further. Did you notice the spots just after it started raining? Not before? How well does your soil drain? What I discoverd last year that is really important is to have good air movement through the tulip patch, good soil drainage, and buy your bulbs from a different source if you have trouble with them. And good air drainage means weed free... If it is any comfort, my garden partner has just been to San Francisco and she says she inspected every tulip she could find from here near Seattle to San Francisco, and all of them had some signs of pitting including the artificial ones in the restaurant...Someone had splashed water on them! So I am thinking that perhaps I have the most beautiful tulips on the whole west coast this year, for organically raised ones! It sure was an expensive lesson , but I think getting cleaner bulbs is the start.(And we have been blessed with more cooler weather and lots of wind this year).

stinky-gardener, you are so right about Kohls and their return policy. I bought a piece of luggage in Colorado and flew home with it to Ohio and it broke on the first use. I took it back to the Kohls in Ohio without a receipt and they looked it up in their system and just could not find that exact model, though they had the same brand. After several different people getting involved, I sat there scouring my brain and said to them, "You know, maybe I didn't buy it here, maybe I bought it at another store." They said not to worry, exchanged it for a brand new suitcase and sent me on my way. When I got home, I found my receipt, I had bought it at Walmart!

Well I'm NOT a blue person. Indoors I have NO blue. My husband doesn't understand this. I have no idea why I feel this way. Outdoors things are different! I have a blue/yellow/white garden bed which I love. Yes, delphineums, catananche, campanulas, baptisia and more, are mixed with trollius, coreopsis moonbeam, peony Claire de Lune and low growing white clematis and aquilegia. It is a big mix and wouldn't be any fun at all without the blue! There are loads of clematis that are purple or blue/purple, but also some very nice blues I think. You do get into the question of "what is blue?" My husband and I think this could well be a male/female issue! Also, by saying a flower is blue, perhaps a catalogue gains more sales? * Posted by: coolbeans (My Page) on Sat, Feb 2, 02 at 13:12 This is my VERY favorite thread, and I totally agree with all those who feel that there is just "something" about blue flowers; they ARE magical, they ARE very special; and they make me happier than any other color flower. Don't know why...I just started a flat full of Bluebird delphinium seeds I saved from my one lonely plant last year. A bunch of them germinated, so now I can't wait to have a huge stand of them! Maybe they won't bloom this year, but maybe they will. And also "true blue" penstemons, I'm trying for the first time. I can't get enough of this precious color. * Posted by: Anne_Marie_Alb (My Page) on Tue, Feb 5, 02 at 17:47 WOW....... Did anyone realize that this thread started almost 5 years ago... on Feb. 15, 1997!!!!! I am amazed it has survived that long. Probably, the oldest thread still on the top page! I wonder if "Clare B" (who started the thread) is still an active member of the Garden Web!!! I personally love blue flowers (I mean blue, and not purple, which I also like). I can't believe how many blue flowers I am starting from seeds this year... and that was just a pure coincidence! I also love RED flowers.. Maybe, I should start a "red flower" thread! I will first check the archives! * Posted by: Clare (My Page) on Thu, Feb 7, 02 at 20:34 Yes, Ann_Marie, I am still here! I will be a bit sad to see this thread fade away when it hits the 100 posts mark. After that, the threads are closed. I don't think I have any true blue flowers still. "Victoria Blue" Salvia is the closest thing. I use it a lot. It is such a heavy, long bloomer, and about one in twenty of them will survive winter here. Just wish I could predict which would survive so that I could save seed from those alone and perhaps work up a more hardy strain. By the way, the Hydrangeas in Memphis, Tennessee are incredible. Some are so saturated blue that I'd have to call them navy. * Posted by: Dswan (My Page) on Sat, Feb 9, 02 at 22:37 I'm going to add to this extremely long thread only because there really is something to true blue. I grow from seed a very difficult plant to propagate called Penstemon cyananthus or Wasatch Penstemon. I cold stratify and plant these every year in hopes of gettting one or two in my garden every year. Absolutely gorgeous. * Posted by: Rosa (My Page) on Mon, Mar 11, 02 at 10:24 Did no one mention Gentians-now those are blue! (along with my favorite penstemson of course-some are indeed blue). * Posted by: pineshade7b ) on Mon, Apr 15, 02 at 11:02 i agree with gloria mc coy. i love blue and green , they are my favorite colors in anything. just look in my house and closets. blue..ocean, blue jeans, my own eyes are blue and my husband's are green. many reasons to answer -why blue. although i do not "hyperventilate" , if i should go into a nursery and ask for a blue -flowering plant and the staff looks down their nose at me, i'll know now that they are only doing it because they think I'M a snob. until i adopted gardening as a serious hobby i had no idea that blue was a "snob" color. i just naturally began to look into flowers in the colors i liked personally. you learn something new everyday. i would have been hurt and confused to walk into a nursery and be looked at like a pariah, what did i say? now i know, thanks clare. * Posted by: DesertGardner (My Page) on Fri, Apr 19, 02 at 12:38 Wow - I never knew there was such a controversy over the color blue in the garden. After reading all the posts, I now understand why some gardeners prefer the color. And I have to say that I've never met any gardeners whom I would consider snobbish. Most of them are really quite down to earth! (if you pardon the expression...) I recently tried planting a red, white and blue flower bed, with 'Victoria Blue' Salvia being my blue color. It's a little too purple and doesn't look right as a "patriotic" design. I will probably tear out the red and white and keep the "blue" (purple) since it seems to like this desert heat. Someone mentioned black flowers, and I remembered seeing black pansies in the most recent Burpee catalog. They're a beautiful velvety black with a spot of yellow in the center. I think I'll plant some this winter, and start an obsession with black flowers! (just kidding Clare...) -Kara [* Posted by: yeona_sky (My Page) on Mon, Jun 24, 02 at 0:37 I just bought a blue poppy and am nervously watching its progress. My success with blues has been an up hill battle, but that hasn't changed my desire to spotlight it in my garden. Why blue?, again it's a passion with me. Clare, I hope you get the last word on this thread, and I hope you understand Why blue, a little better. * Posted by: Duster (My Page) on Wed, Jun 26, 02 at 23:56 I agree with the many others about getting annoyed when purple is referred to as blue. Maybe that's why I take up the cause of truly blue flowers! 99% of my Delphiniums are the true electric blue ones. I'd love one of the Himalayan Poppies but just not right for my little yard. I like the blue flowers, rather than the blue foliage plants. And no, blue is NOT my favorite color - I have nothing blue in my home decor. I just like the uniqueness of the TRUE blue and my stubbornness to get people to stop calling it purple!!!!