Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Growing => General Gardening => Topic started by: pipfit on January 19, 2015, 19:10
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Anybody have any ideas as to what I can grow for cut flowers.
Thanks In Anticipation
pipfit
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A friend recommended Sweet Williams to me as she used to sell them at work.
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A friend recommended Sweet Williams to me as she used to sell them at work.
Sweet William are one of my favourite flowers for scent, really takes me back to my youth. Was just watching Great British Garden Revival showcasing growing lilies this week. Not as daunting to grow as some fear, in fact I might just give them a go this year.
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Dahlias, larkspur, sweetpeas, marigolds, scabious, roses and godetia are all on my list for the coming season. I usually have enough flowers to not buy any for the house for the whole summer :D
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We're growing a load of flowers for cutting this year. We always do sweet peas as they're dead easy, smell amazing and look great and they keep going and going.
We're also hoping to grow larkspur, cosmos, gerberas, Echinacea and a load others that I can't remember of the top of my head!
Here's a handy resource for ideas: http://www.sarahraven.com/flowers/seeds/cut_flower_mixes_meadows
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Have a look at Higgledy Garden website. They (well, Benjamin and his dog, Furface) specialise in seeds for cut flowers - all taken from his own flowers in his 'cutting patch'. I've grown them for the last couple of years and they're brilliant :D
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Was just watching Great British Garden Revival showcasing growing lilies this week. Not as daunting to grow as some fear, in fact I might just give them a go this year.
Bit of a short cropping season - unlike Sainsburys et al that sell them all year round. If I could grow them all year round I would ... and save a fortune in not buying them, for the house - can't resist a bunch, or three!, when I see them in the supermarket ...
Worth snapping off just a few (2 perhaps, no more than 4) segments off the outside of the bulb (try to get some basal plate with them) and chuck them in a zip-lock bag with a few spoonfulls of just-damp vermiculite and leave them somewhere warm-ish. Pot up when they have formed a nice little bulbil and you should have a flowering size bulb within a couple of years. Buy 5 decent sized bulbs now and have 20 in a couple of years time :)
(http://kgarden.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/img_6306_lilyscaling.jpg)
For species varieties I have, accidentally by failure during dead-heading!, let a seed head form. I sowed that and got hundreds of seedlings ... again, a couple of years to flowering.
(http://kgarden.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/img_5844_lilyseedlings.jpg)
Got a bit carried away with just one seed pod!
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Some are better cut-flowers than others - i.e. last longer in a vase and don't droop as soon as you've picked them Perhaps Giggle for the info.
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I'd love second higgledy garden. Just upset that I don't have more space :)
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I'd love second higgledy garden. Just upset that I don't have more space :)
I have just dug out three largish (well largish to me ;) ) triangular beds that are specifically for cut flowers this year. They have two sides just under 3m in length.
Maybe you could find an odd corner somewhere sunny, Ash?
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Anybody have any ideas as to what I can grow for cut flowers.
Thanks In Anticipation
pipfit
a good cut flower is Alstromarias they last for about 3 wks ,and they come back year after year good luck :)
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I'll have a try but I'm onlynin the back garden :(
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I am also growing flowers for cutting this year. On my list are larkspur (which has just reminded me, the seeds are still in the freezer!), sweet pea, cosmos, nigella, calendula, cerinthe, sweet williams, wallflowers, zinnia, dahlia, cornflower and verbena bonariensis.
I don't grow lilies any more, I am fed up of fighting a losing battle with lily beetles. :mad:
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Could I grow Lilies successionally by lifting and keeping the bulbs in the fridge? I'd be happy to grow them in pots thereafter.
I wonder how cold they have to be to keep them dormant? 10C I can do much more easily than <5C.