Honeywort. Nice plant! I've grown the blue and it has reseeded slightly in the gardens. I wish it would do it a bit more. :O) I would plant in a container which would accomodate Nasturniums, and don't be shy about the number of plants which go in. Something tells me that a single plant won't create the 'bouquet' effect. A single purple on it's own won't be noticed, but a bunch of them will stop folks in their tracks, hence the reason I'm saying plant a few in one spot. They are not 'common' plants in the gardens - completely underused IMHO. I truly admire the one you've chosen!

I've just had the 'Purpurescens' and this will the 2nd year growing them from original seeds rec'd in trade. Cerinthe belongs to the Boraginaceae Family. Easy to germinate and grow and I love the combination of the waxy leaves against other darker leaved foliage. Mine started forming flowers two days ago here...just about the same time as last year :) They don't like it overly wet feet and need full sun. Here's a pic of mine from the other day

Congratulations!! I can't believe you did all that work in two years. It made me breathless just reading your list. I started WSing just in 2006 and grew lots of things without really researching them e.g. buddleia, asclepias, and gaillardia are half-hardy in my zone and must be replanted. I am now at the point where I am removing things (sometimes giving them away) and really planning the spaces I have. I also have spaces which have changed because of trees maturing in the neighbour's yard and that requires changing the plants in the border. I hope that by next year I'll have a look that I like. Looking forward to seeing your pics.

I tend to collect from all my flowering plants and they are a mishmosh collection, some bought before I started WSing, some grown myself from bought or trade seed. I've found that some seeds from hybrid plants (i.e.purple millet) grow just fine from collected seeds, while others are not true to the parent but sometimes nice anyway! I figure I'm not losing much (just some pro-mix, which I'll recycle for a pot or something anyway)by trying and I really enjoy collecting seed. My biggest frustration is that I will occastionally purchase a plant and get excited about the possibility of it flowering and setting seed (and growing more next year!) and it won't flower (some fancy plectranthus I bought this year) or it flowers but I can't find and harvest seed (Veronica "goodness grows"). The best thing about winter sowing is the very low "risk" - if even 20% of my jugs are duds, I haven't lost much. When I used indoor lights and had to baby everything inside it felt much more risky to try things I wasn't sure would work out. My advise...Get out there and collect some seed! I imagine that there is not a lot of time left in zone 6 as I am almost done in zone 7! Nancy