Garden Tips Newsletter
Sow Annual Flower Seed NOW for Fall Flowers
August 3, 2009
Direct sowing now is an easy way to get inexpensive color into fall. We as gardeners are able to select seeds and throw them where and when we want quick, colorful displays. By sowing seeds of zinnia, tithonia, cleome, celosia, cosmos, and marigold and other quick blooming annuals now you can be cutting flowers in as little as six to eight weeks in some cases.
Those of us living in north Mississippi may feel a little more urgency in getting those seeds into the ground now, as our growing season usually stops with a killing frost around Halloween. Our brethren to the south have a few more weeks of growing season to enjoy the flowers if sown now.
Loosen the soil in bare areas of your beds, scatter the seeds, rake the seed lightly into the soil, water and in a short while you will see seedlings emerge. Keep the seed bed moist during the germination process. If some of the areas come up sparse, transplant seedlings from thicker areas to make the planting more even. As summer changes to fall, nighttime temperatures turn cooler and flowers hold up longer. Late in the fall when your plants decline, or are killed by frost, you can simply cut them down with a nylon-string trimmer or lawnmower.
For more information on growing annual flowers for quick color and display, check out the Extension publication, #2449 Grow Your Business with Flower Signs. This publication was written to assist agribusiness owners with flower displays, but has great cultural and plant choice information for the home gardener as well.
Lelia Scott Kelly, Ph.D., writes Garden Tips weekly and is a Horticulture Specialist with the Mississippi State University Extension Service. Her office is in the North Mississippi Research & Extension Center, Verona.