I know next to nothing about them, so what can you tell me? I have seen some seeds for sale and the pictures look interesting - are they difficult to grow? How long is their flowering season?
Hi FC, Happy New Year! I used to grow S. Kew Blue without any trouble. A bit of gentle heat in Feb or March (like all tender annuals, the earlier you sow, the longer you have to look after them through the Spring) and they did well either in planters or in the garden. I never got them to self-sow like petunias do here, though.
Happy New Year @noisette47 Thank you - I am looking for a relatively easy year in the garden this year, so trying to keep the number of different plants to a minimum, and these looked quite nice. I am looking at 'Royale Mixed' for use toward front-middle of my borders.
Perhaps more middle-of-the-border plants than front-line. T&M reckon 2' high and they're about right. They'd look good with the foliage Ipomoeas or silver foliage in front, though..
Blimey, remember these from my bedding plant days It was quite a while ago, and they probably have some better strains around these days, but I found they didn't stand up well in bad weather, a bit spindly. Very nice coloured flowers though, so worth a bit of effort. Seem to remember them being sticky.
Yep, they can get spindly, @pete, but like petunias, chop them back, give them a feed and water and off they go again...
The flowers can be a bit sparse and don't stand up to rain very well, as Pete says and also can be prone to collapse from root diseases.Like Zinnias they need a good Summer. I used to grow a few thousand every year at work and they can look look stunning in a large bed.
