First Basement Blooms

Okay, so it's actually just a solitary bloom. But my one of my impatiens "Super Elfin Mix" produced it's first flower. Poor plant is now going to have to wait 2 months to go outside. Currently, you can still drive your truck across the lake, snowmobiling is the top recreational activity, and a nearby community just had another ice fishing derby.

Other than that, I've been pinching off the tops of my other plants, making them more bushy, while delaying their flowers. This Gerbera daisy "Dwarf Pandora's Mix" is going to bloom soon. I know that you can buy Gerbera plants at Walmart, so owning a plant isn't anything unique. However, I grew this plant from seed, starting it last fall. I'm quite impressed that I got it to this point.

Here's one of the flats of seedlings under the grow lights. It contains Phacelia, Asters, Lemon basil, Purple basil, Lobelia, Scabiosa, Papaver miyabeanum, Godetia, and Portulacas.

The Speedy Impatiens

I grew impatiens (Super Elfin Mix) from seed this year, for the first time in my life. Definitely easy for beginners. Now, some of the plants have flower buds.

Super Elfin Mix is a great variety of impatien. I bought some as bedding plants last year and grew them in a large container in the shade. They don't need any pinching or special treatment, though they do seem to need well-draining soil, as some of the seedlings in pure peat got "wet feet" then wilted and died. I've potted them into bigger pots, using potting mix to which I've added an extra bag of perlite.

African Daisies: These Osteospermum sinuata "African Sun" (Dimorphotheca aurantiaca) are flourishing. I find it curious that Thompson & Morgan sells these seed to Canada and the US as Osteospermum sinuata and to Europe as Dimorphotheca aurantiaca (AND with the same picture). I read on another garden blog about these plants being renamed, with Dimorphotheca being the most recent designation -- and something T&M should fix for us keen North Americans.

A hybrid "Sweet Gold" cherry tomato: I go to sleep with visions of these tomatoes in a large container, surrounded by a lush collection of herbs. Stay tuned to see if dreams really do come true...

I found these at Dutch Growers in Saskatoon: clear orchid pots, which are ideal for monitoring root growth.

One of my orchids doesn't flower very often (Dendrobium nobile), but will vegetatively propagate itself at a rate that makes me give orchids away like unwanted zucchinis. If I underwatered and neglected this orchid more (at the appropriate time of year), it would probably flower more often for me. At any rate, I needed some proper pots for all the baby plants, so these are great.

Rosemary as a basement-grown herb. It grows well indoors and tasted fabulous on roast chicken and potatoes yesterday.