Dear Dell, As you can see from some of the responses you have gotten there is a wide difference in which Gladiolus can be grown successfully outside depending on where you live. There are tropical species and there are species that are covered with snow in winter. There are species that have rainfall year round and some that get most of their rain in winter or summer. There are species subjected to hot temperatures in summer and species where the temperatures are mild year round. There are species that occur where the rainfall is very low (and I suspect some years when rainfall is so low don't even show up) and species growing where there is abundant rainfall during their growing season. Throw in the different kinds of soil they grow in and it becomes even more complex. So to grow these successfully it may first have to do with choosing the right species for your conditions. A species that has naturalized for me, Gladiolus carmineus, is described as growing very close to the ocean as I do. I've shared it with my friend Bob Werra who lives two hours away and inland and he does not have the same success. Joyce's comment that winter growers don't do well where she lives in Gresham, Oregon may not have to do with the rainfall, but with the temperatures where she lives or with species selection. There are southwest Cape species that get more rainfall than she gets and I can grow many winter rainfall species successfully and my annual winter rainfall is greater than the amount she gets. Where I live we have a big problem with thrips that turn the leaves of many of the native plants silver in summer. (not an attractive silver). I might be able to grow summer rainfall species if I wanted to keep them dry in winter and water them in summer, but then I'd have to contend with the thrips which don't usually bother the winter growers. I've found a lot of the species I grow are happy in my raised beds growing in 9 to 10 inch deep pots. I've not always had success in germinating seed, but Diane Whitehead shared her technique with me and I did some tests with some seed I had a lot of and in the future am going to switch to her method. I'll leave it up to her to share it. I'm in the process of expanding the Southern Africa Gladiolus pages on the wiki and adding a lot more pictures (going from 4 pages to 9) of current species and adding some new species as well. I've worked on it a little every day for quite a few weeks now and I'm almost ready to add all this to the wiki. It's interesting that this corresponds with the current thread. Mary Sue