If not deadheaded, Lychnis coronaria self-seeds everywhere, including the lawn, but it is relatively easy to pull. It gets a bit messy looking as the flowering stems age and accumulate old blossom sites. It likes full sun and won't grow in the shade of other plants IME. It is a true biennial and I have seen it in screaming magenta (the normal form), white, and blush pink. Nice frosted rosette of leaves the first year.

Tropical lowland Hoya species are ok with night time lows between 15 C and 10 C. Sensitive species would be best closer to 15C but I think these are the exception. Still some species will really let you know if they get too cold. As soon as you start dealing with species from the mountains/higher elevations they become much more tolerant of lower temperatures. Most of the Eriostemmas are from lowland habitats and they like it hot during the day and warm at night. It seems to be quite common for people to post photos of their Eriostemmas showing what looks like chlorosis. Chlorosis (lack of chlorophyll) is usually due to either an unhealthy root system or a nutrient (macro or micro) deficiency. Eriostemmas commonly grow in alkaline soils so my first guess is that the plant is not able to use nutrients properly if the potting mix is too acidic. Are you using anything to help adjust the pH? Crushed limestone, oyster shell, or dolomitic lime? The leaf in your photo does not really look chlorotic, at least there is still a lot of chlorophyll present. I wonder if in the case of your plant of this is not a fungal disease? Mike

Hi Robert, Mairzy's suggestions here are good, I myself was first smitten by the curly, twisty leaves of H. compacta (I'm crazy about texture, the stranger, the better). Then again, for easy blooming you/she might consider H. multiflora, which many folks find quite a quick & easy bloomer. The H. Kerrii is beautiful but gets big: big leaves, big stems & quite long, heavy stems. This one needs a hoop, trellis or some support for its weight, but also to keep it contained (mine in the bathroom has been invading the shower stall for 2 yrs. + now), I finally had to curl it up onto a hoop to keep it w/in bounds (& to prevent houseguests from knocking it over into the bathtub!). Like Ceropegias (several of which I grow), Hoyas have the added advantage that they can readily go into hanging planters. Or one can grow small pots of them (& they prefer to be underpotted/rootbound). If you go over to the Hoya Gallery (right nearby, click at the top of the Hoya Forum), you'll see current threads w/ pix of most of the Hoyas mentioned in these responses. Welcome to you & your girlfriend to the Wacky & Wonderful World of Hoyas. But DO be forewarned, some folks find them VERY addictive! PS -- I see you're in Calif, pls. check Cena's pix thread, she's got all kinds of blooming Hoyas from which you can choose & they seem to love Calif!

Ilene, I think George is growing Moon and Stars, and someone else may be as well. When I have grown Moon and Stars, I've gotten large (20-30 lb) melons with a very dark green rind with the bright yellow moons and stars (many more stars than moons). The flesh has been a fairly bright red (not pink) in the case of original M&S or bright yellow that is almost a golden organgey-yellow when growing Yellow-Fleshed M&S. The flavor of the red-fleshed one is very much a true, strong watermelony taste that is sweet but not overly sweet. The flavor of the yellow-fleshed one is a bit more mild. When I grew the yellow-fleshed one, I am almost positive it had white seed. So, I am not sure if you have a different strain, or crossed seed or what, but your watermelon sounds different from the ones I've grown. The blue rind question baffles me. Every M&S I've ever seen has the rind that is a dark blackish-green with the gold spots. I have heard some people describe the dark green rind as 'purple' and I don't see that either, but assume the rind is so dark that they are seeing it as a purplish-black. One problem with knowing what to expect with M&S is that there are many strains of it around. Unless they've changed in recent years, the one offered by Seeds of Change is very small compared to other strains, and is round like a bowling ball. The one from SSE is most like the one my dad grew. Southern Exposure Seed Exchange sells several strains that are different from the original, including Amish Moon & Stars and Long Milky Way Moon and Stars which is very oblong in shape and has tons of stars and no moons, or very few moons. I believe Long Milky Way was bred by Sandhill Preservation Center's Glenn Drowns. There's also a Cherokee Moon and Stars but I don't think it is markely different from the original M&S except its flesh is pink or pinky-red. In addition to the aforementioned strains, there are some other strains available to members via the SSE yearbook, and that used to include M&S Moons of Jupiter and M&S Early. I didn't take the time to drag out the old yearbooks and look for descriptions of those two. However, I did pull out Amy Goldman's melon book to check and see what she lists for brix (measure of sweetness) for M&S and she shows a brix of 10. Here's the brix numbers for a few of the other melons she lists for comparison's sake: Carolina Cross 9, Sugar Baby 9, Fairfax 11, Blacktail Mountain 10.5, Chris Cross 8, Tom Watson 12, Orange-fleshed Honeydew (which I find very sweet indeed) 13, Old-Time Tennessee 12.5, and Santa Claus (aka Christmas) 9. Moon and Stars is a wonderful melon when picked fully ripe and I think you have either an odd strain or crossed seeds or something. Dawn