Kathleen wrote, >Can anyone tell me about Lobelia tupa? Mine had one stalk for 2-3 >years, flowering late each summer. This year there are 5 plants, all >about 3-5 ft from the original. I'm trying to decide if these are >seedlings or shoots from underground runners. My Chilean native plants for the garden book mentions propagating this species only from seed, not from root cuttings. In nature one sees this species as a single clumping plant or as a colony, but I don't know if the colonies are formed by seed or stolons. Seedlings should be noticeably smaller than the parent plant, which when mature can have a stalk up to 2 meters tall or even more. However, when I grew it in the Pacific Northwest, it never got that tall. Jane McGary Portland, Oregon, USA