Delphiniums from California

Mary Sue Ittner msittner@mcn.org
Sat, 21 Jun 2003 10:59:33 PDT
Dear Nan,

I have sent seed of some of these to Dell for a future BX so if you are not 
a PBS member you may want to join. Also Ron Ratko has Delphinium seed in 
his catalog and many of the seed exchanges do as well. I have gotten my 
seed from NARGS, Cal Hort, Ron Ratko, and collected it in the wild. I 
understand John is willing to share seed of that Delphinium if he collects 
it and has enough to share.

Delphinium seed has a reputation for being short lived, but I haven't found 
that to be true. The Delphinium species of California that are dormant in 
the summer from my experience are best started in the fall. If you keep 
moving them up to deeper pots you can sometimes get them to bloom in the 
same season. Otherwise usually the next. There are mountain Delphiniums 
that do their thing after the snow melts. Many of them are quite amazing 
and obviously need moisture at a different time than the coastal ones. I 
mostly have avoided those and concentrated on the ones I expect to be 
happier in my wet winters, dry summers. I haven't lost any of them I grow 
that I have left in containers to spend the summer mostly dry when dormant. 
In the ground the loses have been much greater.

Mary Sue


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