Pictures would help showing both the plants and where and how you are growing them. Without that, all I can say is 9 out of 10 times lavender dies, it's due to an issue with too much soil moisture. You could be watering too deeply, too frequently, or the soil isn't draining fast enough. The Moisture Control mix is not a popular choice because it has a substance added to it that serves to retain water, which is the last thing you want with lavender. Also, I don't know your reasons for adding all that to the potting mix, but at the least it isn't doing any good and could be making things worse. Lavender likes quick-draining, sandy to gritty growing medium with a slightly alkaline pH and low nutrients, and all the sun/heat they can get. Something like a cactus/citrus mix might work. For more information on how to grow lavender,this website is has good information (just ignore the silly background).

The word mild depends on where you live. The ancestors of the modern hybrid come from a monsoonal climate. Warm, wet summers, drier winter. They are hardy "outside' here down to about 2C. and seeing that the average winter day temps here is Min 7C Max 17C they are no problem to grow. The monsoon forest tends to lose all its leaves in the dry season so the orchid needs high light to flower. Some of the modern hybrids are more tolerant of less than ideal conditions. Growers here use treated Radiata Pine bark as the base of various mixes. Mixes in more tropical places tend to be more arid because bark breaks down quickly in tropical places. So you will get info. that varies according to the source. Use spag? You can grow anything in spag with the right conditions. Wrong conditions such as cold and wet lead to problems.

Mary, That is a beauty. Are you meaning the flower buds as they open are not complete and have separated petals on them? I get this occasionally on a few in particular. It always seems to be only a few and the rest all good. I have heard of people speaking of this and there is a lot of speculation, but no definitive answers? Rick

Jeff, self-pollinating can be done but I haven't paid much attention to the 'intimate' details. You might try two things when flowers are open. Tap the branch near the flower stalk with a pencil or something similar to create vibrations that potentially loosen and spread pollen to appropriate flower parts. Also, get a soft artists brush and dab lightly from flower to flower. Seeds produced, whether naturally or artificially, on a single plant are called 'selfed' and only genes within that particular plant are involved. If flowers from two unrelated plants are involved, the gene pool is larger and more varied and far more likely to produce offspring with characteristics different from either parent. But selfing is better than no seeds at all, and you never know what you'll get. If you put plants outside for the summer, you should get a croton of another variety, grow them close together, and hope they flower at the same time. Don't wait for the ants, try the procedure with the brush between flowers on both plants. This is your best chance to get offspring that are really different from parents. That said, all cultivated crotons are hybrids, so they have a soup bowl full of genes compared to species plants, so even single 'selfed' plants can produce a variety of characteristics. Seed pods will be small, round, and green, turning very dark brown or black and larger with maturity. Pods will eventually split open in several places and seeds will be lost if you don't catch them somehow. Seeds are black, angular and less than an eighth inch around. Try wrapping the stalk with pods in a section of nylon stocking or something similar. I should do this, but instead just look for seedlings on the ground. Your croton is one of two vintage varieties, either Petra or Norma. They're nearly identical and easily the most-produced varieties in the world. Maybe there was a label on the pot when you bought it indicating which one. If you try this, keep us posted on how it goes. If you need different varieties, I can offer propagations from my collection of mostly vintage crotons, if you'll just pay the postage. Obviously though, plants would be some years away from flowering size. Russ