BLUE COLEUS

Thanks for the heads up, i'm just very interested to grow them, the foliage is striking on some of the varietys i have seen (apart from the photoshopped blue) it would be interesting to see what happens if you decide to buy them and they germinate.

 

I bought some pure white artificial lillies for the downstairs loo from China (i know, peasantry)
They looked lovely for around 3 months until the spray paint fell off. This is how they look now..
Be wary of our chinese friends!

 

Nicotiana Lilium, lovely shade of yellow

 

And as florists have known for a long time, you can achieve all kinds of interesting colours by putting ink in the water. It's a neat trick for dried flowers, getting the colour into the petals/leaves before you dry them. It's not going to help you from seed though!

 

And those very nasty dyed Heather's often on sale.

 

Urghh! Reminds me of 80's Spanish holidays where we all came home holding a felt donkey and a cactus covered in 'glued on' flowers lol.

 

Viva Espania

 

Looks like a llama to me. Wrong side of the Atlantic and wrong hemisphere, I think!

 

you just haven't seen many long-necked donkeys is all

 

Looks more like a long eared Alpaca to me.

 

This is consumerism at it's worst... A one 'size' fits all Donkey/ Llama / Alpaca to cover multi global holiday outlets.
I bet they were produced in China and subbed out to a factory in Taiwan.
Back on topic i see that Thompson & Morgan are offering a blue poppy meconopsis 'Lingholm' which is promised to grow in 'the most difficult shady areas'