Any Poppy experts out there at all?

Hello!!!
Just wondered if i could pick someone's brains on Poppies? basically i planted some seeds last week, only in a pot and nothing has happend as yet. Am i being too impatient? should i wait longer? The reason i ask is that i've just planted some Lily Of The Valley (they weren't seeds, sort of bulb things really - excuse the lack of knowledge, still learning!!) and they have started shooting up like nobody's business!

Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks :D

 

I think the poppies could still come, not sure but I think they need to be sown on the surface, ie. not covered with compost.
Also they dont like root disturbance so best sown where they are going to flower.
Sure someone else knows more about poppies.

 

Cheers Pete. :D
They were sown on the top of the soil, not too deep.
Whenever my mum has sown poppie seeds she has just thrown them over her front garden and they flower all summer, looking beautiful so i can't see why they wouldn't grow when i've sown them?

I'll wait a little longer, maybe it's me being Miss Impatient.

 

I have just looked in an RHS guide to germination times for Papaver(poppy - but no more specific) and it says quick (up to 30 days) / Medium (up to 90 days). So patience I think.

My first Aconitum seeds have just germinated - after 12 months!

 

If its the corn poppy - then I've found they do best following the way they used to grow. Scatter the seeds in the autumn - then lightly fork the soil over in January time - they seedlings used to appear for me shortly after that. Whenever I tried to sow them in the spring without - nothing happened that year.

 

That's good advice - the way the plant does it, if at all practical, is generally best! I generally help verbascums (not that they really need it!!) if I'm working in a nice wild area, by gently running my hands up the flower stalk when it's ready, or shaking it, before cutting down the stalk - it works!! And then you get loads of little plants to take to somebody else's garden!!

 

These were just broadcast last year reckon every one came up did the same a couple of weeks ago it rained and they are all up.. from seed saved :D

 

I just luv Poppies :D

 

And another..always a big show for such small effort.

 

I hope you are all talking about the various kinds of ANNUAL poopies. The perennial border poppy is easy enough from seed, but an absolute s..... to get rid of. Many years ago I followed conventional wisdom and planted the seedlings of Papaver hybrids in straight lines in a nursery bed so as to be able to choose the best colours for planting in the borders. It took me over 5 years of digging and weedkiller to get rid of the unwanted ones. I have a horrible feeling that at least one of them is still alive and just witing to pop up in the middle of the veg garden again.

 

i sowed a packet of wildflower seeds [cornfield] last august, i can only see two varieties ,one of which quite tall, with a feathery leaf i might try forking over in the bare areas

 

Yup mine are all :D annuals.

 

Sadly mine are not - I introduced some oriental poppies and two have proved to be absolute thugs. Doubt I will every get rid of one of them.

 

Oh Fran...I wish all thugs were so beautiful.. :rolleyes:

 

I've found the deep, taprooted yellow California Poppy Eschscholtzia californica will easily succumb to Weedol but once they have seeded you have them for years. Very persitant viable seed.