#wordlesswednesday- Mum’s garden -grown from seed

/ karen

A gallery from Mum’s garden today, to show how a plot can be filled -just by growing seeds. Most of the seed packets came free from garden magazines. Our favourites are Amateur Gardening and Garden News. All we needed was some compost and seed trays, and both our gardens are currently overflowing with colour. Everyone knows I am a thrifty gardener. Do you have any money saving tips?

Dahlias grown from seed last year have overwintered in the ground. These are supposed to be annuals, but the mild winters mean we get two years out of the plants.

I love this deep red dahlia, part of a mixed colour packet of seed.

This double white dahlia shines out in a semi-shady spot under some trees.

Morning Glory climbs up through the standard roses and mini fruit trees in Mum’s garden. Great for attracting beneficial pollinators such as bees and butterflies.

We have pale blue and white varieties flowering this year, as well as the usual deep blue ipomoea.

Rudbeckia. We think this is Marmalade. Grown from a mixed variety pack. Bees absolutely love this plant and it flowers until first frosts.

New to us this year, this is Osteospermum Limpopo or African Daisy. This is a lovely mixed white, yellow and apricot pack from Mr Fothergill’s Seeds – free in Amateur Gardening Magazine.

Another Mr Fothergill’s seed, Chrysanthemum Eastern Star, in a range of colours – yellow, white with a yellow centre ring, and lemon. So beautiful, and lasts two weeks in a vase. Our new favourite cut flower and one we will grow again next year.

Mum’s garden looks so sunny with these annual chrysanthemums, sown in the spring and planted out in early summer. We think they will flower until October at least.

Our Thompson and Morgan Zinnia Candy Cane Mixed have been delighting us all summer. Such a fabulous range of colours and sizes. We love the mini flowers in the centre of each bloom. Truly beautiful. This packet came free from Garden News.

Cosmos Seashells make good cutting flowers. We love the intricate petals on these flowers.

More Chrysanths. We’ve never grown such a lovely range of colours before.

Rudbeckias mixed varieties. These often over-winter if the weather is not too severe.

Love this delicate cosmos Seashells. Such a pretty petal shape.

Have you grown any flowers from seed this year? What are your favourites? I hope there’s not too many photos in my gallery. I got rather over excited because Mum has a good internet connection and photos only take seconds to load. Sadly at my house it takes about 15 minutes per photo, and even then it sometimes all disappears before I get the chance to post my news. Sigh.

37 thoughts on “#wordlesswednesday- Mum’s garden -grown from seed”

  4. Hello Karen, You could have posted double the amount of pictures of flowers and I would have enjoyed them endlessly! For the first time this year we have sown some meadow seeds that we bought from the Gardens Illustrated show in April. They have been star performers throughout July and August! I’m a total convert! I also feel your frustration at uploading pictures too, our internet is horribly slow, If I don’t kick the rest of the household off their devices, I can’t upload a thing! Hope you’re having good weather and enjoying the BH weekend x

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    • Hello there. Oh that’s wonderful. I hope you have posted some photos.I’d love to see your meadow flowers. Thanks for your very kind words about the photos. I did get a bit carried away. It was so lovely to upload the photos in seconds rather than 15 minutes per photo at home. Still, I love living in the countryside – so I must just be patient. We had a lovely day today thank, thanks. I took mum to a NGS garden that had ploughman’s lunches and cake, so we had a lovely walk around a pretty garden and a wonderful lunch. The volunteers work so hard to raise money. I’m glad we were able to go. Enjoy your bank holiday Monday. I’m repainting my black greenhouse. It might be a bit of a hot job! xx

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  5. Lovely photos, Karen, and I was wondering if you could spare us some wider shots of your and your Mum’s gardens sometime…? After the huge success of my cutting beds this year I realised too that you could easily fill a whole garden with annuals if you chose. Mind you, I think I need to pot up annuals for a while before I put them in the other beds as there is too much competition from perennials while they are still small. What dahlia mixes do you eecommend? Mine tend to come out mostly yellow! The annual chrysanthemums look interesting too. Thanks for sharing

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    • Hello Cathy. I’ll have a go at wider photos. Well, mum pops her annuals in amongst everything else and seems to get away with it. I have the same problem as you, they struggle if I put them straight in the garden. So this year I am growing the cut flowers in their own beds on the veg plot . I’ve got 10 1.3m wide by 3m long beds with little slab paths between. I’ve just dug up all the potatoes and replaced them straight away with a whole bed of sweet williams, and half beds of stocks, candytuft, wallflowers, and foxgloves for next year. I’m clearing another bed for hardy annuals, pot marigolds,larkspur,love in a mist and poppies. My best dahlias came from Wilkos for £1. I’ll check the names and get back to you. Hope you are enjoying the bank holiday weekend. Love karen – and Mum xx

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      • Wow – my cutting beds will be nothing compared to yours! You must have lots of space to play with in your garden if you can fit all these beds in 😉 Be prepared for the pleasure your cutting beds will give you, with or without cutting from them. I never tire of gazing at mine, soaking in their beauty and the wonder of being able grow such beauties from seed 😊 Well done to your Mum for successfully mixing her annuals and perrennials!

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      • Thanks Cathy. I hope you are enjoying the sunshine today. I’m desperately trying to reclaim my cuttings patch this weekend. The brambles have suddenly put on a spurt of growth. It feels like a race! Hedgehogs are slowing down progress. No forks or spades can be thrust into the border for fear of injuring one of them. Much careful brushing back and forth with a broom goes on. Mum sends her best wishes xx

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      • It is so easy to take your eye off one area to find it overrun with weeds or whatever. I have decided I need to implement a rota here to work through each area in turn as far as maintenance goes, then back to the beginning – there will always be favourite areas otherwise. Hope you managed to reclaim your cuttings patch. Best wishes to your Mum too

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  6. Fascinated with the beauty of your floral macros,they’re all really flourishing!I particularly like Cosmos with the tube-shaped petals!Are they hybrid or open-pollinated varieties?Anyhow,they are incredibly showy,Karen,I felt as if I were in the Garden of Eden 🙂

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    • Thank you for your lovely comments! The cosmos are called Seashells. Very well named, don’t you think. I think they must be a f1 variety. Thanks so much for reading and for taking the time to get in touch. It’s much appreciated 🙂 x

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      • My pleasure.Thanks for letting me know,I’ve an obsession with the seeds,I try to save some heirloom varieties from my mother’s garden and we usually exchange them;sadly,lovely species have ceased to exist.As for the onomatology,I always believe that there’s so much behind a name.Yes,their shape looks excactly like a seashell 🙂

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    • Sounds really lovely Cathy. Same here. I’ve got some deep scarlet snapdragons which are almost like velvet. They have seeded all over and flower all summer. Love in a mist seems to have disappeared from my front garden. I’m sowing some new plants for next spring. Thanks for reading and getting in touch xx

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  9. Hi Karen, no, not to many images at all. A great example in what can be grown from a few packs of seed. Most of the plants in my cut flower beds have been grown from seed. I don’t know what size images you are uploading but when our internet was very slow (before they managed to miraculously improve the speed) I always made my images smaller and as I got in the habit over the years I still reduce the size of images I’m going to post. It takes few extra minutes to do but it makes uploading much faster. Also means that your readers if they don’t have a fast connection can download them quite quickly too.

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    • Ah, that’s very useful to know. But how does one do that. I usually upload them and then edit them down a size. But they sometimes come out fuzzy. I need to reduce them before uploading. Our internet is useless. We are a mile from the nearest village. And even the village hasn’t got fibre broadband yet. It’s very frustrating. I’m wondering if you could post a lesson on uploading photos. I’m sure other people will want to know. Thanks for reading and for kind comments. xx ps. All my photos are just taken on the i phone camera.

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  11. Lovely flowers, I especially like the chrysanthemums. As you know most of my flowers are annuals grown from seed. They’re mostly self-seeded or from saved seed. I think that the cosmos have been my favourites this year. xx

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    • We’ve never tried the chrysanthemums before, Mike. They have been amazingly prolific. Annuals are so rewarding, and cost little- if not free! Thanks for reading. Have a lovely day. I hope it’s sunny on your plot 🙂 xx

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    • Thank you Gill. Mum and I are both thrifty gardeners and it works really well to share plants. One packet of seed is too much for one garden- and mum sends the spare plants to me. I return them as cut flowers each week for mum and mum-in-law next door. Thanks for reading. Your blog does make me laugh out loud. can’t wait to see what you get up to next! Much love- karen xx

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  14. Karen your photos are wonderful as the great variety of beautiful flowers grown from seeds. Your Mother and you are expert seeds growers. I am a mess. I like all the flowers. Las Dalias is beautiful. The Cosmos very beautiful. The Rudbequia love it. The divine chrysanthemums. And all the other magnificent ones with precious colors. It has a divine garden. Greetings from Margarita.

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    • Ah, Margarita, your lovely, kind words have made my day. It is true, my Mum is an expert seed sower. And I benefit! One packet of seeds is too much for one garden, and so Mum sends her spare plants my way – and I return with bunches of flowers for Mum. It’s a very good arrangement and suits us both! Thanks again for taking the time to read and get in touch. It is much appreciated. Greetings from karen- and Mum xxx

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  15. I loved your photographs. As to seeds, I’ve all but sworn off using them. A friend sent me coleus seeds, and I managed to murder all but seven plants. My stats are miserable. I’ve told my husband to pull me away from seed displays in the spring as a kindness to others. I’m glad you and your mom are very successful seeders.

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    • Ah Anne, you have made me smile. I must admit, I manage to murder quite a few plants here too. My Mum on the other hand, has green fingers and anything she touches just seems to grow like magic. Mum can buy a bargain basement plant for 50p that’s on its last legs- and manage to nurse it back to health. Thanks again for taking the time to read and get in touch. Don’t give up :)) xx

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  16. They look beautiful! Having relocated to Romania, I’ve had to abandon my Cornflowers and (overwintered) California Poppies. One of the latter plants didn’t seem to realise it was supposed to be an annual and put on a wonderful (if unruly) display of flowers from spring onwards. I kept saying I would have it out because it had grown far too big and branched for where it was and was falling all over the place, but the poppies were so beautiful I didn’t have the heart to do it!

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