Two weeks ago, Sunday March 16th, I began prepping for the coming spring. Inside a southern-facing window I set out Zinnia (Zowie), Echinacia (Magnus), Marigold (Fireball), Salvia Lady in Red, Butterfly Pea (or Clitoria ternatea), Love-in-a-Mist (Nigella damascena), and a seed of Pacific Blue Giant Primrose (Primula x polyantha). The first four are from Burpee, the last three from Whatcom. All are growing in peat pots filled with commercial seed-starting mix.
I believe it was last year I attempted to direct sow zinnias, and they just kept disappearing. It's possible a pest got to them (since I do recall seeing the seedlings), but part of me just suspects that they were too small to hold together in a storm, and got washed away. So this year I'll just start the plants in the peat pots and then set them outside after they've got some extra size on them.
As for the survivors from last year, I was very surprised to see the dwarf snapdragons making a comeback in their window ledge. Several of the larger snapdragon plants simply never died over the winter, and so new growth is popping through swollen stems. And although I never recall purposefully letting a flower get away from me, it appears that at least some snapdragon seeds made it to self-seed. I noticed tiny little seedling starting yesterday.
I fully expect the morning glories to come back as well. I left last year's vine in place to give this year's growth a helpful foothold. But I plan to add the Butterfly Pea to the pot as well as the Zinnias.
The lavender pot looks awful. That's okay: it's supposed to. Last year I'd cropped it fairly close to the soil line, and then dumped left-over soil on top. But I expect it to come back just fine. Now that it's a well-established plant it has plenty of roots just waiting for springtime. Even though we haven't been getting a lot of warm weather here in Philly, we haven't been getting freezing weather, either.
That same Sunday I undertook a frightening task: seperating and repotting the pair of Organ Pipe Cactus that I'd started from seed. It had gotten to the point that they were starting to poke each other, and so I risked replanting. The roots were small and near to the surface of the pots. I put each cactus in its own pot, and now I've just been waiting to see if one or the other will keel-over from failure to set. I should point out that even though this cactus can theoretically become quite large, it grows slowly. Even now the larger one is only about two inches tall and an inch wide, the smaller one is about the same height, but thinner. Hopefully each will get some additional growth this summer hanging out in my window!
I'll try to post pictures later, but figured that updating the text while I had a chance would be nice.
