I'm bumping this up in hopes "muffienh" or anyone else can tell me if Agastache Purple Pygmy germinated, really bloomed first year as advertised. If all of these were successful, were hummers attracted to it enough to nectar? Also, did "ellen_s" or anyone have success with Asclepias curassavica and was it winter sown, germinated indoors under lights or direct seeded in ground late fall/early winter even though it doesn't need cold stratification? I ordered 25 Asclepias curassavica seeds and was thinking of direct seeding some in front/behind spring blooming bulbs at same time I put those in the ground. I'll put rest of seeds in containers to get into enough sunlight. I put zinnias around bulb territory this past spring but took 2 months to get them large enough to bloom since rabbits kept eating them back. Hoping they'll leave milkweed alone. I'm really most interested in anyone's experience with the Agastache Purple Pygmy, though. Can't afford to buy them as plants so seeds were my next best option if I don't mess up germinating them...LOL. Hoping they germinate well, bloom first year and attract/feed Hummers. If anyone sees this post, thanks in advance for any advice or experience you can offer.

Oh, Wilmingtonislander, you are so supportive! Thanks for your offer to put my name on a Passiflora! I don't know what kind I have (seeds came from someone on GW), but since the plants haven't died, just haven't grown, I'm not inclined to pull them up quite yet. Maybe they're just waiting til something changes, lol. Ever hear of the building maintenance man who was supposed to fix the heat/a/c system - he couldn't heat it up and then he couldn't cool it down! Sometimes I am mystified by gardening here, and think the plants are too - do they want sun, cool, rain, dry, sand, or what, ha. But, I'll get onto it eventually. I'm a student at Armstrong right now, as my assoc degree isn't getting me anywhere here. Going for the bachelors degree. I have the credentials, just not the college degree on paper that they want. Hoping that once I'm done, I will be able to get a job! I go full-time (scholarships and such), so not much time for personal stuff when I'm studying, as I have to keep my GPA up. Once I'm done with school and hopefully have a good job, then maybe I can do the garden club thing, lol. And, though I'm getting close in age to the 'blue hairs', as you so aptly refer to, I shall never get old! I am young at heart, and refuse to ever change. Perish the thought I should ever get caught up in the lifestyle of 'cultured' table and board games, and gossip. I'm a hands-on doer, and not one bit embarrassed by it. I'm already having to make major adaptations to do things due to arthritis and artificial joints. But nobody can tell me I have to have an 'old' attitude! I would definitely not fit in with the crowd that hires everything done, nor with the ones that do floral arranging. Not my cup of tea. Let me just go dig in the dirt, lol. For whoever asked, I'm on Wilmington Island myself. Love the islands too. Very quiet neighborhood, very nice people here. And, no, I didn't know there was a bamboo farm here. Do you know what the name of it is or can you tell me more? Sounds like a good adventure for me! Maybe take that one in before school starts (and it's coming fast!) Ok, I'm going through my seeds here to see what else I can get into today . I just spray-painted 3 baskets from Walmart that had badly neglected Mothers' Day plants in them, and they finally marked them down to half price, with the Mothers' Day tags still on them! Lordy, I just about cracked up. Is it any wonder the little plants weren't doing very well - the baskets had plastic liners, and the pots were sitting in baskets half full with water! But, the kalanchoes were none the worse for the wear. I am getting the soil dried out to what is more normal, cleaned up the baskets with bleach to kill the mold, and they are freshly spray painted. Sorry to drone on, gals, I'm just trying to learn and do things on a student's budget! Have a great rest of the weekend and thank you for being so nice and generous! jeribelle

direct sowing - Some things do best when direct sown, but it depends on the plant. Many things that don't like root disturbance and some vegetables are best when planted this way. winter sowing - This is often a less labor intensive solution. If you use milkjugs/2-liter bottles and poke drainage holes in the bottom (like frequently suggested in the Winter Sowing Forum), you shouldn't have to worry about the seed drowning or drying out. Do remember to provide partial shade so that the seeds don't cook in the covered containers. indoor sowing - This is the method I use for most of my seeds. I have a large rack system loaded with fairly closely spaced florescent bulbs of the right frequency (some 4100 K and some 5000 K) to approximate sunlight and timers to control the on/off cycle. Of course, when fully loaded, it does add to the electric bill. I tend to plant many of my seeds about a month before the last expected freeze date. Some adjustment may be needed for especially slow or especially fast growing plants.

leava, You're welcome. stockergal, I have put off planting while waiting for the wind to calm down. The wind shift line that crossed through the state overnight is just beginning to arrive at the northern edges of our county. I'm hoping that after it blows through (all the flats of plants are in the greenhouse) then maybe I can proceed with planting. Our wind forecast is lower today that what it had been, so I think I'll be able to plant today instead of waiting until tomorrow. I can hardly move at night too, and it makes me feel so much older. I just get up the next morning and push through the muscle stiffness and soreness. My body can recover after I'm through planting or after the gardening season ends, whichever comes last. Ha! The early heat bothers me. While a few warm days and early spring seem promising, once it is much too hot for too many days, it starts feeling like it might be an omen that a bad summer is on the way. My lettuce, kale, snap peas and spinach were miserable yesterday in the upper 80s, full sun and wind. I hope the next few days of cooler weather make them happy again. I'd hate to see those cool-season crops finish up too early because of the early onset of heat. Some years it is so hard to get a cool season harvest because the hot season arrives too soon, and this might be one of those years. The cool-season flowers are much happier either. I'm still sowing succession crops of lettuce so that when the early lettuce (which is nearly full-sized and which I've been harvesting using the cut-and-come-again method) burns up in the heat, we'll have younger lettuce coming along. I've been contemplating growing lettuce and spinach indoors on the light shelf in the spare room for the rest of the spring/summer, because the early heat makes it seem like it won't last very deeply into the warm season this year. After the tomatoes are planted, I then can focus on planting the flats of warm-season annual flowers I've been growing. They've been sitting there patiently waiting for their turn to go into the ground, and this week they finally will get planted. I hope. You know how that goes. You go outside with a plan in your head and sometimes things happen that divert your attention elsewhere. The early warmth kind of has me in panic mode too. I'm actually not only on track but have many things planted earlier than usual, yet I feel the warmth breathing down my neck, urging me to hurry up, hurry up, hurry up. It is crazy to feel behind when I'm really ahead and it makes no sense. On the other hand, walking up onto the shaded, east-facing porch and seeing 88 degrees on the thermometer in the middle of the afternoon in early April makes no sense either. I like May/June weather, but would rather see it in May and June where it belongs. Jen, I hope you're feeling better. Miagraine headaches are no fun. I had them often until after going through menopause, and then they vanished. I am overjoyed about that. I don't even bother keeping notes any more. Even if I remember to jot stuff down, I misplace the notebook and then find it a couple of years later and say "oh, there it is". So, what's the point of keeping notes to begin with? I save myself the time and effort by just not bothering. I can't wait for the sun to come up and the wind shift line to roll through so I can go outside and get those tomato plants in the ground today. Or, at least I'll start. I might not finish in one day since I plant so many, and I plant slowly and deliberately, staking, labeling, caging and mulching as I go. Otherwise, if I leave some of those tasks to complete on another day, I have a hard time getting back to them and completing them. I do better when I make myself do the whole thing all at once. There's nothing worse than planting without caging and then not getting around to it and suddenly realizing one day that the plants are too big now to get cages around them/over them. I also know that whenever I have a plan to plant all day, it seems like our fire pagers start going off and ruining my day, so I won't say that I am going to plant all day......but it is what I'm hoping for. Dawn