I have a lot of baptisias in sun and a fair amount of shade (tho they much prefer sun). I have moved some and previous posters are right, they have a *very* deep root system. But the good news is that indeed they can be moved with enough muscle power. Here in Mass., I like to move things in the spring so they can make root growth before winter. Fall transplanting of anything has not been a big success here. It's still early enough so that, once it's done blooming, cut it back hard and move it. Then water, water, water til fall. A happy baptisia should not flop, unless it's newly transplanted or very young. I do lop off 12"-18" after bloom as they shade out their neighbors, my fault for planting close. But this is one of the great perennials, IMHO. No pests or diseases, great flowers and foliage, no staking.

The blooms were a deep blue purple, not the light purple color I've seen on Purple Smoke. I have lost the tag to my plant over time (probably washed away with snow runoff) but I'm ALMOST positive it said indigofera. But I guess not. I really don't care which I have, I love the plant. I was just curious. Thanks for all the responses!

Caryopteris don't really need the chill but will winter sow all the same, they just won't germinate until things warm up some....and they self sow for me here. I'm not as big of a fan of 'hunk of seedling' planting as some here (understanding we all do things a little differently) and will thin (scissors) a pot of woody sub-shrubs like caryopteris, keeping just a few strongest seedlings in a batch. (surface sow these seeds, don't cover them deeply) Foxglove winter sow and transplant well. I prefer to direct sow annual poppies, although some will say they transplant without issues if very young/small. My problem there is our wet, when annual poppies begin to germinate my beds are still a little saturated from our coastal winter for digging and I'm not working in them yet to be transplanting. I literally toss the seeds and hope the birds don't find them all, put no effort into them. I've never had very good luck sowing baptisia unless very fresh, I harvested and sowed some same week last summer and they germinated immediately. I have the seedlings still in the pot they sprouted in, have moved it in and out of my garage overnight for a couple of cold spells where temps might fall below about 30F. My plan is to tease the strongest 6-8 apart later this spring and try transplanting then. Hopefully someone else who has straight winter sowed them will have something to add....when we're all more used to the forum changes, I know some are still struggling a little ;)

I planted several of these years ago. They always came back. In fact they ended up being a large clump. I had 4-5 of them in a wildflower garden in my front yard. We are in the process of building and moving and I decided that the house will be more appealing to the masses without the "unkempt" wild flower garden. So I contacted people and they dug up all the flowers. But the following spring 4 clusters came back up thru the newly planted grass. I didn't have the heart to mow them over so I let them grow all summer long till early fall and dug them up and transplanted them in a field at the new place. I am glad to report they are up and doing well. I also have a massive clump that I planted out on a hillside in the tall grass. It has done exceptionally well. I decided to move it this spring. Well it was a solid mass of root ball that I could not break out of the ground. I tried hacking a clump off and it didn't work out well. I decided to give up and leave the hacked half exposed clump and go onto other projects. Well that hacked and half exposed clump is doing just fine. Its getting ready to bloom. This root mass was about 1 1/2 ft in dia. and in the summer the "bush" was about 3 ft tall and 4-5 ft in dia. A real prize specimen that I hope the new owners will appreciate. All off these plants had at least 3/4 of a day of full sunlight. Not all the soil was the greatest. some was clay and the hillside was gravelly and very thin on decent soil.