Entries by diversifolius

Re-starting warm sowings

A weird phenomenon is happening with my indoor sowings one species after another: the seedlings would start to elongate excessively right away after germination, just to vanish in a blink of an eye afterwards (exemplified with Minuartia michauxii). Species like Minuartia, Silene, Luetkea and others like them have done the worst; a few more vigorous […]

Timing the sowing in springtime

The Crocuses, snowdrops, the first Hepatica in bloom and others announce that spring is in the air, a bit too early this year. It is an exciting time with renewed hope when we all think about new plants to add to the garden and new ones to start from seeds. Some people plan well ahead […]

Little March

It is March 1st and the flowering snowdrops announce an early spring. Another confirmation comes from the first Iris reticulata, Eranthis, the well-developed buds of Helleborus, Adonis and Corydalis, as well as chipmunks running around. Setbacks are to be expected for sure, but what’s done is done, or better said, what’s flowering is flowering, and […]

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Updates and Dobrogea self-guided tour

An update to the HWT treatments of last week: Anthyllis montana and Astragalus missourinesis seeds were the first ones to react; they were sown and the first Anthyllis montana seedling showed up this morning! It seems that not all Anthyllis are equal, Anthyllis vulneraria var. coccinea seeds were slower to imbibe, and are still receiving […]

Something old and something new for 2024

Winter returned yesterday and the kettle was on for tea; the perfect day to start the warm sowings and to test the hot water treatment (HWT) on more species. A customer asked me more details about Lespedeza violacea, Violet bush-clover, seeds recently and I realized that I forgot to check it with the HWT, so […]

Ready, start, go – 2024!

This is the almost traditional post for this time in February when the washing of the pots for indoor sowing starts! I never wash the pots for outdoors sowing, but you may want to avoid bringing indoors eggs of various insects which can remain attached to pots, and who knows what else. It is enough […]

January thaw

This year we are experiencing a classic January thaw in Ontario. Not only we have above 0°C temperatures, it is also raining. It is a welcome respite from frigid temperatures for both people and plants, and also on this occasion the snow cover gets diminished (where applicable), with nice surprises showing up! The jump to […]

Greens and golds

We are all tired of the extreme cold and cleaning snow by now and dreaming of greens and other colors. When selecting a few spring pictures for a short garden walk to enjoy bright, warm colors I stumbled upon the cheerful flowers of Chrysogonum virginianum Norman Singer’s form. It is a good occasion to spread […]

Adonis: a slow, beautiful affair

What else better for a January gloomy day than the last April’s bright Adonis ramosa flowers? Interested to know more about early flowering perennial Adonis species? I organized my material worth a few years and will share my adventures on growing a couple of them from seeds. Not everyone may be familiar with these wonderful […]

Green hedgehogs addendum

Lacking inspiration, I thought let’s see what was published in January of previous years; and the Green hedgehogs post from Jan 2022 was just what I needed. It seems we have longer and longer snowless periods in the winter, so all perennials and shrubs that retain their ‘good looks’ all year long are now more […]

Onward to 2024!

Due to mild weather a particularly early snowdrop is already above the ground; on the same time, snowdrops seedlings are growing under lights! Such events need to be captured for record keeping. So, instead of the regular year-end flowers review, I’ll write a bit about the excitement of first time collecting and sowing seeds from […]

Holiday greetings

At this time of the year, plants & seeds addicts usually take a small break to review the accomplishments and failures of the past season, while looking forward to a bright, new season. In this idea, I am now looking through the pictures and we’ll have a review of 2023 around the New Year. Amidst […]

 Last seeds of the season

We somehow arrived at the last seeds announcement of the year! As it happens, all species are warm germinators or require first a warm/moist stratification period. Because someone once told me that he couldn’t grow a certain species from lack of indoor lights – I should, once again, write an explanation. All species indicated as […]

Pussytoes and winter sowing

Winter has arrived and with it a bit more time to look after a few postponed seeds. There were a couple of wild collected Antennaria species put ‘on hold’ for good reason. They are difficult to identify, sometimes even specialists may encounter problems because of the widespread polyploidy and apomixy among them. Most Antennaria species […]

November seeds and learn to ID your Phytolacca

Latest native species added to the Seeds List: from the well-known by now Asclepias exaltata to new donations from friends, always thankful for them: Rudbeckia maxima, Giant coneflower Phytolacca americana ‘Variegata’, Variegated pokeweed and Musineon divaricatum, Leafy wild parsley I had somewhere an older picture with Rudbeckia maxima but cannot find it. If we look […]