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zen_man

It can be fun to breed your own zinnias - Part 27

zen_man
9 years ago

Hello everyone,

Welcome to this ongoing message thread. Once again, the previous part of this continuing series, It can be fun to breed your own zinnias - Part 26, has become rather long and slow to load or read, with well over 100 messages, so we are continuing the series here for yet another fresh start.

The same guidelines apply here. Anything remotely related to zinnias is fine. As always, if you have any related pictures, you are invited to post them.

Fall is not far away, and I have begun spraying my older zinnias for Powdery Mildew. I also have started some newer zinnias with the hope of getting in a Fall "crop" of zinnias. This is a picture, taken today, of part of my zinnia garden.

{{gwi:20025}} Today was overcast, with some sporadic light rain. My breeders make up a minority of my zinnias. Most of my zinnias are kept for the benefit of butterflies and hummingbirds.

Hopefully my Fall crop of zinnias will provide some useful green seeds that I can use to start off the indoor phase of my zinnia hobby. My indoor phase will probably start again this year sometime in October.

I am always optimistic that next year's zinnia garden will be better than this year. My goals for next year are bigger blooms and better plants. And of course, a continued push for more unusual flower forms. As always, I look forward to hearing from all of you.

ZM

Comments (114)

  • queen_gardener
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    I've been saving my seeds too, and was also amazed at the 39 degrees last night, so most of my day today was spent bringing in all my many houseplants I'd scattered around outside. I now have 4 hanging indoor plants and only 3 hooks :-) haha! Before I brought all this in, I was going to try growing one little zinnia on my kitchen windowsill, but now I'm not going to - it's pretty stuffed in here!!!! It would have been fun, since I miss them so much in the winter, even with all the other plants to keep me company.
    Does anyone else love to draw zinnias? I used to make the prettiest cards several years ago with these paintbrush tipped markers, drawing mostly zinnias and roses and day lilies. (Dahlia-typed flowered zinnias, probably my fav)

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hello Queen-Gardener,

    "I hope I'll be showing my pics on this board next year - I'd like to set up a few SFG beds for next year's veggie/herb/selective flower beds. "

    Do you plan to put your zinnias in the Square Foot Garden beds? If so, I have some comments about that. It is true that most people probably allow less than a square foot per zinnia in their zinnia beds, so a square foot is an improvement over that from the standpoint of the individual zinnias. But I plant my in-ground zinnias much closer than that, in rows 16 inches apart but seeds about 4 to 6 inches apart in the rows. Obviously 4 to 6 inches apart in a row is much closer than is "good for" the individual zinnias, but, because I am trying to improve my zinnias, I cull them at first bloom. I thin them pretty heavily in the name of growing only the best ones. So a lot of those zinnias get removed, leaving probably more than a square foot for my selected "breeder" zinnias.

    Every early Spring I also start a few dozen zinnias inside in 3.25-inch square pots. I try to pick some "good" seeds for those pots and I almost always plant only one seed per pot. If it doesn't come up in a few days, I replant it with another "good" seed. Now, even though I planted a "good" seed in each pot, I don't know if it is going to be "good" when it blooms out. But I do space those seedlings about a foot apart in the row (the rows remain 16-inches apart), so there is a "double standard" for those zinnia seedlings started early indoors under fluorescent lights.

    If I were doing Square Foot Gardening, I would probably plant more than one zinnia seed (three or four) in the middle area of each square foot, with the idea that when they first bloomed I would pick the "best of the bunch" for that square foot and remove the others.

    Commercial "field run" zinnias tend to need a lot of culling, because for one reason or another the seed companies don't do a good job of that. The F1 zinnias don't need culling, and the Zinnia marylandicas (Profusion, Zahara, and Pinwheel) don't need culling because they are reasonably uniform. But for some reason as soon as a seed company commits a new zinnia strain to field-run production, that strain starts to "run out" and degrade in quality. Seed companies can't afford to lavish the individual care on their zinnias that home gardeners can do.

    So any commercial field grown zinnia strain can easily be improved by home gardeners, who can thin out the culls and keep the better zinnias and save seeds from the best zinnias. This year I planted a bed of Burpee's Burpeeana Giants zinnias, and I am saving seed from only about 5 percent of them. Hopefully those seeds will show some improvement next year. One thing I want to do is make big zinnias bigger.

    Actually, I expected better of those Burpeeanas, because they were from a grower in Holland. I will buy more Burpee Burpeeana zinnia seeds next year, with the idea of repeating that to widen my gene pool of Burpeeana-type zinnias.

    "Does anyone else love to draw zinnias? I used to make the prettiest cards several years ago with these paintbrush tipped markers, drawing mostly zinnias and roses and day lilies. (Dahlia-typed flowered zinnias, probably my fav)"

    Well, the dahlia flowered zinnias are pretty easy to draw, because of all the closely overlapping petals. You just start in the center making U-shaped petals and continue around in a spiral doing that until you get the zinnia as big as you want it to be. Most of my "real life" zinnias aren't that easy to draw, because their shapes can be rather complex. I suppose you could start with a photo on a computer and trace over the boundaries. And there are several computer programs for converting photos into artwork. Maybe I will show some examples of that in a subsequent message.

    More later. We might get a rain tonight.

    ZM

    This post was edited by zenman on Sun, Sep 14, 14 at 21:34

  • samhain10 - 5a
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    ZM - Supposed to rain here, too. Don't think it made it below 40 last night, but I could be wrong. I've had a fire in the woodstove for the past 4 days, since I've been here working instead of at the shop. The cats are grateful.

    Queen Gardener - yes, just lately I photo-shopped some of my zinnia pics using the filter called "colored pencil", but I haven't been doing any real-time drawing for awhile now, though I used to.

    My two little zinnia plants that I have inside for the winter, are doing well. Which reminds me: Zenman - how tall can I expect the indoor plants to get, given that one of the parents is a cactus zinnia? Surely they're not going to be as big as what they'd be outside, which is 3-4 ft. Will have to work on my lighting system.

    I gathered quite a few green seeds out there today, but the rest I'll just leave till after frost I guess. It's kind of cool being able to feel the difference in a viable seed and one that didn't get pollinated. Thank you for that. I've already got way more seeds than I'll have room to plant. It's a big part of the reason I was anxious to come up with a decent marking system - so I'd know which seeds were actually ones I'd pollinated. As I said before, my methods so far were only half successful. But I'm still working on it. :)

    - Alex

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi Alex and Queen-Gardener,

    Wow, Alex! Who knew that breeding a blue zinnia would be so easy? Just out of curiosity, what version of Photoshop are you using?

    Hi Queen-Gardener. Now it's my turn. This is the photo I am going to use as the basis for my "art".

    {{gwi:20096}} Now we tell the computer to make a sketch from that, drawing lines around the important parts. Do it, computer.

    {{gwi:20097}} Now we tell the computer to make a color painting from the photo. Do that, computer.

    {{gwi:20098}} Now we combine the drawing with the color painting. Computer, are you listening?

    {{gwi:20099}} Voila! Computer art. Admittedly that is not the most "painterly" piece of art there ever was, but it is a start. I'm kind of rusty at this, and I need to "bone up" on this computer art thing. More later. Incidentally, you can click on those pictures for the larger versions. Don't forget the trusty old F11 key. Stupid computer. Has to be told everything.

    ZM

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi Alex,

    "My two little zinnia plants that I have inside for the winter, are doing well. Which reminds me: Zenman - how tall can I expect the indoor plants to get, given that one of the parents is a cactus zinnia? Surely they're not going to be as big as what they'd be outside, which is 3-4 ft. Will have to work on my lighting system."

    If the lights aren't intense enough, they will stretch and grow right into the fluorescent bulbs. I have had them do that. They jammed their flower buds up into the shoplight fixture, between the bulb and the reflector, and "cooked" their flower buds. Be sure to have some way of either raising the light fixture, or lowering the support for the plants.

    It shouldn't be too expensive to upgrade your system. You can get economy grade shoplights for about $12 for a two-bulb 48-inch T8 fixture. They come without bulbs but you can get T8 bulbs for about $3 each (don't spring for the extra price "plant" bulbs). If you buy the bulbs in boxes of 10 you can get them for less than $3 each.

    I prefer the "cool white" bulbs with a Color Temperature rating of 5000K or higher. My last box of Philips bulbs had a rating of 6500K and a Color Rendering Index (CRI) of 85. If you put two fixtures over your zinnias, with cool white bulbs in one and warm white bulbs in the other, the zinnia plants will lean dramatically toward the cool white bulbs. I figure that if the zinnias prefer cool white, then I will give that to them. That is a controversial subject, though.

    You can accelerate the growth by setting your timer for at least 16 hours of light and 8 hours of dark. I think that last Winter I wound up at 17 hours of light and 7 hours of dark.

    You don't have to use fluorescent shoplights. You could use strip lights, which don't have a reflector, so you can put them very close together. The shoplights I now use have a minimal reflector, so I can put them very close. The more fluorescent bulbs you can get over your zinnias, the better. Within common sense limits, of course. With just two plants, you might be able to get by with just a few CFL bulbs. (compact fluorescent lights) You might even want to experiment with LED lights. Some people are. More later.

    ZM

    This post was edited by zenman on Mon, Sep 15, 14 at 13:25

  • samhain10 - 5a
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    ZM - hold on, hold on - going too fast! Just answer me this: can I put the T8 bulbs in a regular "garden-variety" as they like to say - 4 ft double-socketed shoplight? Or do I have to get a new shoplight to house the bulbs? I can hack the expense, but if all I need is the bulbs, all the better.

    Yes, I already leave the lights on for long hours, though I may be changing the lighting scheme soon to match what I generally do in the early spring with my veggies. That is, I have the lights on during the dark hours, when the plants can benefit from the little bit of additional heat, and then in the day I have the lights off. I know those fluorescents don't put out all that much heat, but even that little during the cold winter nights can be a help, I feel. Perhaps I'll do what I've threatened to do for years as well, and set up an incandescent bulb with reflector in addition to the fluorescents. Gotta go - cats are reminding me I haven't fed them.
    Later - Alex

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi Alex,

    "...can I put the T8 bulbs in a regular "garden-variety" as they like to say - 4 ft double-socketed shoplight? Or do I have to get a new shoplight to house the bulbs?"

    Look your shoplight over carefully. It might say something on it. If it currently has T12 bulbs in it, it is probably an older fixture with an old analog magnetic ballast. The newer T8 shoplights have digital electronic ballasts. If you have any written description regarding your shoplight, it should tell you whether it can accommodate T8 bulbs or not. Unfortunately, the "tombstones" in the ends of the shoplight will fit either T12 or T8 bulb prongs, so you can't go by them.

    Incidentally, the electronic digital ballasts are somewhat sensitive to current surges, so it is better to run them on a surge protector. Some timer switches can create a little surge. The kind of surge protector that has an on/off rocker switch with a place for maybe six different plugins and costs about $12 or a little more should be adequate. We are not talking about protecting from mile-long lightning bolts here.

    ZM

  • samhain10 - 5a
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    ZM - John's telling me that he thinks the two shoplights he purchased recently to replace some old fixtures in our back room of the shop (it's an old building - 1870's, though of course the lights aren't that old - heh heh) are ones that take T8 bulbs, and he ended up only using one of them. I'll take a look at it tomorrow. He also says it's one of the new kinds of energy efficient bulbs, and smaller around - definitely not the same as the old bulbs. Well, I'll work it out. I can always walk across the street there in the village and go to the hardware store. Handy, that.

    Pretty cool artwork! Like that multi-phase approach. And the effect of the coloration with the layer of line drawing. I'll have to do one in return in a minute here. Think I can find a zinnia photo to work from, what do you think? :)

    - Alex

  • samhain10 - 5a
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Nope - having trouble with creating the layers. It's telling me no pixels are selected. Stupid computer. You know, I did this not long back creating new bookmarks. Can't figure out why I'm not getting it to work now. Oh, god...I might have to...READ THE MANUAL. Computers - my personal bane.

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi Alex,

    "He also says it's one of the new kinds of energy efficient bulbs, and smaller around - definitely not the same as the old bulbs."

    Yes, the T8 bulbs are smaller in diameter and more energy efficient. The old T12 bulbs are decades-old technology.

    On that computer art, when all else fails, read the manual. That art I showed was done with a Photoshop plug-in from a company named Topaz, and the plug-in I used is called Simplify. (scroll down on that page, a lot of stuff is down below the top of that page) It's not bad for an inexpensive plug-in. They have a free 30-day trial version. I have some other computer programs I could use, but I haven't read their manuals and am way too busy with gardening to do that now. Actually, I do enjoy computer art, it's just that I never seem to have the time to really get into it. More later.

    ZM
    (not associated with any product or vendor mentioned or linked)

  • mister_guy
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    If you need to buy new lights, and you want to grow full size zinnias indoors, I really recommend biting the bullet and taking advantage of all the hard work the dedicated stoners have done bringing down the cost of high power lighting and reflective tents down. It really doesn't take very long buying $5 color appropriate high power fluorescent tubes and even $20 fixtures before it adds up to just buying little high density light kit on Amazon.

    I justified at least SOME of my excess because I'm a photographer, and I had built myself some DIY hotlights for portraits and white box work, so I had a lot of fixtures I cross purposed. Maybe it says a lot about my lack of self control, but this is kind of how my math worked:

    1 packet of zinnias, under 1 florescent light in 1 tray of seeds became 36 hard to pick between babies, which takes up another 2 or 3 square inches each, so the light become an array of lights on a shelf. Then those babies grew into a dozen or so favorites, each of which needed 3 to 5 square inches, so they outgrew the first lights, and plus, by then, I was having fun so I had roses and cuttings from gardenias establishing too. Then the simple four foot shelf became an eight foot shelf, with an array of lights.

    But see, to have REAL results, if you're impatient, you have to grow as many babies as possible, so the babies had barely popped out their buds when the first buds when they started getting crossed and green seeded. Suddenly there's another tray of 36 popping up, everything starts getting leggy and pushy.

    ZM has self control, and a lot of room outside. My bright idea was to only plant culls in my garden, and keep all the favorites in perpetual summer inside. My thinking though, was that since I had all the lights, why not force as many generations through as possible in pretty darn good growing conditions. So while he uses the real world, I set about finding out how other people set up mini-worlds inside.

    My current set up costs, in fairness, a few hundred dollars total. I bought an inexpensive starter kit of a HD light and digital ballast that can put out 600W of either HPS or MH light, and is dimmable, for about $150, which isn't that much more than replacing a shelf's worth of tubes, and to maximum it's potential I bought myself a grow tent at around a hundred bucks to keep all the light in, and some duct work and a fan to suck the air out into the hallway from my spare bedroom. I haven't had it operating long, the tent was a birthday present recently, so I can't totally declare victory, but it seems to be doing what you'd expect, and helps keep me from overflowing into the rest of the room! I haven't really put a TON of effort into the ventilation of it, because the temperatures are staying in the upper 80s in a 73 degree room, but winter coming should help me out there.

    I can now only keep what fits in the tent, and my garden is starting to fill up various shades of purple.

  • samhain10 - 5a
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Mister Guy - I am saving this info for future reference - or in case, I win the lottery. :) It's good to know, but really, I'm not planning to do too much of this raising plants to blooming stage indoors. These two I have under lights right now may be the last for awhile, as I have figured I can do what I said some comments back in this thread: that is, get 2 generations by starting some of my special hybrid seeds in March when I start my peppers, eggplants and some other flowers. By the time they are getting big, I can take the risk of transferring them to the unheated greenhouse until the time to plant outside arrives. They will be flowering early enough to allow me the chance to start green seed from them that will flower and be harvested before first frost next fall. That's good enough for me right now.

    ZM - looked at the shoplight John was talking about, and it is just what you were mentioning. I observed the one that was already in place in a darker area of the store - it appears to put out a very bright light. The bulbs are also the cool white ones. And, happily, there is a spare shoplight that I can take right now, since when he bought the first one, he saw there was another and figured it would be good to have a backup. Except now it will be a plant light instead. Yay me!

    Speaking of stupid computers, I had written a long response to your last comment, and then when I went back later, saw that instead of posting it, I'd somehow deleted it. Couldn't have been my fault! (sigh.) Anyway, I don't remember what I said except that the manual for my Photoshop Elements 12 that I got just last year, is 423 pages long. Part of my reason for why I haven't studied it - it's intimidating. But I will eventually have to go look up the layering stuff, since I don't seem to remember how to do what I did before. [ imagine many curse words here]. The program I was using before PS12 was PS3 which we bought already installed in my laptop. When I started shooting manually and saving pics in RAW def files, I decided it was time to upgrade. The new version is so much in advance of the other, it's scary. I don't know half of what it can do yet.

    So here's a multi-step pic which isn't actually a layered pic. I WILL figure the other out...

    - Alex

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi Alex,

    "...except that the manual for my Photoshop Elements 12 that I got just last year, is 423 pages long. Part of my reason for why I haven't studied it - it's intimidating."

    I am still using the old Photoshop CS3 (I think they are up to CS6 now) and it's manual isn't so intimidating, but I bought several third party books for it from Amazon and the total of that is well over 1000 pages. The books were heavily discounted because they were for a very out-of-date Photoshop, which made them just as out-of-date.

    However, I feel fairly comfortable in my old Photoshop CS3 merely because I started using Photoshop back in 1997, when it was just Photoshop 3 then. Very early days. Your PSE 12 is light-years ahead of that old PS3. It may be ahead of my old Photoshop CS3. I have never studied Photoshop intensively, but after using it off and on for 17 years, I have picked up a few things.

    We have all had the experience of crafting a really long masterpiece message, only to have it lost in the transmission stage. It is really a very sickening feeling, because you know full well that you will never be able to re-write the message as well. And you don't feel motivated to even try.

    As you know, I am just naturally "long winded" when I am writing messages, and now I have taken to copying the message draft into the computer Clipboard by doing a Ctrl-a to select all of the message content in the editor and then doing a Ctrl-c to copy it into the Clipboard. As long as I don't turn my computer off, the message stays relatively safe in the Clipboard and, if I need to, I can restore it in the Editor window with a Ctrl-v.

    We are in a somewhat remote rural area and the only available Internet connection is via the HughesNet satellite uplink/downlink service. So everything goes up to the satellite and down from the satellite here, and the same at the HughesNet station, back east somewhere as I seem to recall.

    So our connection is subject to weather interference both here and back east. Sometimes I have to re-boot our HughesNet satellite modem several times in a day. And if the weather is bad here or there, it won't reboot and we just have to wait for the weather to clear. Modern technology! Which reminds me, whatever happened with that solar flare that was supposed to be headed at us? That could play havoc with the HughesNet satellite.

    I spent about an hour today just cross-pollinating my "toothy" zinnias. I hope to grow a bunch more toothies next year and maybe a few this Winter indoors. This is a picture of one of the female toothies taken this evening.

    {{gwi:20101}} I am enthusiastic about that toothy because it seems to have white on the backside of its petals. And this is a Topaz Simplify generated drawing of it.

    {{gwi:20102}} You did get a nice drawing superimposed on your zinnia artwork. Impressive. I am thinking about starting a few green seeds in the basement under fluorescents in the next day or two. More later.

    ZM

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hello Mister.Guy,

    I read your last message with great interest. Your year-round indoor zinnia project is very cutting edge. You very well may be the only person on this planet to attempt a non-stop indoor zinnia project.

    Your HID lighting technology and indoor tent for environmental control are fascinating, and we want frequent updates on your experiment. I have nearly a decade of experience growing zinnias indoors and I don't want to discourage you, but it has been one calamity after another.

    One year I was growing several hundred zinnias in a breezeway that allowed me to have independent temperature and humidity control from the house conditions. I noticed a strange discoloration developing on the zinnia leaves which within a week or two was leading to the death of the leaf. It didn't look like any foliage disease I had ever seen, and it was progressively wiping out my zinnia crop. I mounted a desperate search on the Internet, looking for photos of a similar zinnia foliage problem. Then one day I found pictures similar to my foliage problem, and identified the problem. It was the Western Flower Thrips (WFT). With no natural enemies in the breezeway and, with me being helplessly unaware of what was going on, the WFT population exploded and the foliage damage increased exponentially. I used an 8-power magnifier and a 20-power pocket microscope to observe the thrips finishing off the last of my zinnias. I bagged them all up for a trip to the landfill.

    Aphid populations can also explode on indoor zinnias. I have successfully controlled them with Imidacloprid, a systemic insecticide. The same with fungus gnats. The Imidacloprid kills them as a bonus. In previous years I had used Mosquito Dunks for a Bacillus thuringiensis israelensis (BTI) control of fungus gnats.

    The other repeated calamity I have had with indoor zinnias is spider mites, specifically the Two-spotted Spider Mite (TSM). And once again, the initial attack caught me completely off-guard, unaware of the nature of the problem. I thought it curious that cobwebs were forming on my zinnia plants and, in the strong light from the fluorescents, I could see tiny points moving on the webs. I felt fortunate to have finally seen the "cob spiders" that create cobwebs. And then, suddenly, all of my zinnias were dead. WTF. More Google research.

    Those "cob spiders" were Two-spotted Spider Mites (TSM). And since they aren't insects, insecticides are essentially worthless against them. Outdoors they have natural enemies that keep them in check. Indoors, with no natural enemies, their populations explode.

    Last Winter I was fortunate not to have had an attack from the TSM spider mites, and instead fought a running battle against thrips (again, specifically, the Western Flower Thrips (WFT), which ended in a kind of draw in which I learned that Imidacloprid won't stop the WFT thrips, but Acephate will (but smells very bad).

    I am not looking forward to my next battle with the spider mites. They are like The Borg, "resistance is futile''. I have some Kontos, a systemic insecticide with some miticide action. On my last battle with TSM spider mites, I used the isopropyl alcohol and water spray recommended by Organic gardeners, and lost that battle decisively. The isopropyl alcohol bath did seem to kill the spider mites, but it apparently killed my zinnias as well. Or maybe the dying spider mites killed the zinnias. In either case, I wound up with a bunch of dead web-covered zinnias that reeked of isopropyl alcohol. I was willing to consider the Two-spotted Spider Mites as The Borg, because my resistance was futile.

    I hope that I don't encounter the spider mites again this Winter. I am not optimistic about the outcome of that battle. I am almost certain that I will be fighting the thrips again this Winter, perhaps in the next few weeks. I am more optimistic about that battle. I have Acephate, and I will use it again against them, and it will kill them. And it will smell really bad. I am hoping to find an odorless alternative.

    The stoners have confronted and dealt with some of these problems. I think someone said that Shell No-Pest Strips can control both mites, thrips, and whatever if the plants are in an enclosed area. They are effective against houseflies, but should not be used around children or old people. I think I might qualify as an "old people". That old saying that "whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger" can be sadly wrong.

    But you mentioned an indoor tent, and I had been wondering about making a plastic film jacket that would fit over one of my chrome wire shelving units that serve as plant stands. That might be useful for containing the effects of Shell No Pest Strips or Acephate or whatever. But for the time being I can take my plants out on our open air deck to apply stuff. That's how I applied a lot of Acephate this Spring.

    I could be wrong (it wouldn't be the first time), but I think you are likely to encounter "biological" problems with your zinnias, and some of those problems may prove to be challenging. You impress me as a person who is resourceful, and you may find some solutions that I have failed to find. That is why I am following your project with more than casual interest.

    ZM

  • samhain10 - 5a
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Well, now both of you guys are giving me a case of the heebee jeebees. Mister Guy, because I'm imagining a scenario of multiplying zinnias rather like the animated waterbucket-carrying brooms in the Mickey Mouse cartoon of the Sorcerer's Apprentice, and Zenman, because they're being followed by a horde of Borg-implanted two-spotted spider mites!

    I've never had any problems like that when I start my seeds in the spring, but then I'm not doing it on a permanent or semi-permanent basis. Generally nothing is under the lights from some time in May till the following March. But now I have my two special children up there... all alone...unprotected from Mickey and the Borgs - OMG!!!
    I will have to stay vigilant.

    BTW - they are already putting roots out of the bottom of their little pots, so I will probably upgrade pots today. You can believe I am going to sterilize the pots first after reading your latest.

    - Alex

  • mister_guy
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    I've mentioned before the struggles I've been having. I'm taking kind of a zen holistic approach, but in a techno nerd kind of way. As you hinted at above, when we bring plants inside, it's not enough to simply be a gardener; you have to be everything that would normally act on the plant in the real environment. Excess or deficits are punished with disease and bugs. Too wet and you get fungus gnats, too dry, and spider mites thrive. Too damp in the leaves and fungus can take over, too breezy and or too dry and still and the leaves can dry out in the intense light. So on, and so forth.

    For mites, I've found nothing works better than pruning the worst of it, washing the plants with soapy warm water to physically remove them, and misting the plants for a few weeks heavily. That got rid of the mites, but fungus gnats became a real problem. I used fly strips and a ceramic vase filled with water as a fly trap very effectively until the mites were gone and I could dry the soil back out to kill off the gnats. I also used cinnamon from the grocery store sprinkled heavily to kill off fungus on the soil surface, and it seemed somewhat effective. Smelled good anyway :)

    The latest problem I had MAY have been thrips. The culprits looked like some kind of lice, if I had to describe them. Very tiny white lice that seemed to set up right in the growing bud and stunt everything. The little hairs on the stem got heavy and thick and white, or something thick and white was growing on them, it was hard to tell. Eventually large leaves would pale, wither and die. A combination of Spinosad, neems oil spray, and a copper based fungicide spray seems to have brought those plants back, although they show some definite signs of their trouble.

    I REALLY think like I'm going to start pouring boiling water through any purchased potting mix. It feels to me like I get outbreaks primarily after adding plants potted with store mix. Either that or I need to explain to my fiance that having lady bugs in my growing tent is totally reasonable and a thing a normal person might choose to do.

    Like I keep mentioning, I don't have a lot of self control, and some of these issues are really fascinating to me from a woo woo metaphysical kind of perspective, and I decided that I wasn't going to let having a heavily treed yard, with a steep north facing sloped front yard stop me from playing with all the plants I wanted to. Technology had solved the problem for ILLEGAL growers, I figured growing tomatoes and flowers would be no problem.

    Tomatoes, it turns out, are huge pain in the rump indoors. Way, way worse than zinnias. I keep giving up on them, and then trying again with seeds from germ tests, and then giving up on them again. They get fungus easy, burn easily, get rust and blight seemingly out of nowhere and spread it around, and when you do things well, they are a pain to keep in their allotted space! I think the main difficulty with zinnias is needing to commit to enough wattage to get a full three or four foot of usable light. It just takes bunch of juice to grow more than three or four inches of plants happily.

    Right now, the grow tent is working TOO well at keeping the light and heat and our summer kept my upstairs too warm, so I kept accidentally burning the plants. Between that and the recovery from the thrips, I don't have a ton to show at the moment. Unlike you, my genetics aren't all that interesting to begin with! When the next couple of blooms open up, I'll clean up the floor trays so it's not embarrassing and take some pictures of my set up!

    The whole learning to graft thing, well I have no excuse for that other than I had the light already and I like fruit...

  • samhain10 - 5a
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Mister Guy - stop, stop! You're frightening the children! I may never try to grow another zinnia indoors after this. My poor babies - I had to cover their stomata so they wouldn't hear anymore.

    Anyways, I forgot to say - ZM, really like the latest toothy - I think it might be the best yet. I didn't get around to repotting the kids - will do it tomorrow. Dang, I had a question I specifically came on here to ask, and now I've forgotten what it was.

    Later - if I remember - Alex

  • mister_guy
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Well, at least I don't have any really beautiful breeders I need to preserve. If the bugs get TOO bad, I can always just go back to seedlings and see what I get next! If I had really beautiful genetics to preserve I'd have to be more careful. Right now, I'm just throwing the genetics from a few different sources of seeds into a big pool and seeing what pops out!

    Gardening always sounds worse when you list off only the problems you've had all year! On the brighter side, I have terrible clay soil that I'm really working hard on amending well. Sheet composting went wonderfully this year, and I have a couple rows where things will actually grow well, and the soil actually drains.

    Eventually I'll have the acreage of my dreams, but until then, I'm doing the most in the suburbs that I can, and one of these days maybe I'll have something pretty enough to justify the effort, but until then I'm collecting genetics for the orchards I want to have, and learning how to grow food conveniently at the scale I can handle, as close to year round as I can manage.

    One of these days I'll have retractable high tunnels with solar powered grow lights in giant fields. And I'll STILL probably not have any good reason to justify it, other than I CAN.

  • fullmoon13
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Thanks for the wonderful information on zinnia breeding, this is our first year growing them and they did very well for us! Our favorite for early blooming were the 'poofy' ones, lilliput i think? But this color is my favorite from the fall batch, very peachy, plus the butterflies couldn't get enough of this particular color.

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi fullmoon,

    Welcome to this zinnia hobbyist message thread. Feel free to post more zinnia pics, ask questions, make comments, whatever. Your zinnias look quite healthy and you got a nice close-up picture of them. I notice we are both in zone 5b, although our growing seasons and conditions could be quite different. I am doing some late season pollinations, fighting mildew, and saving seeds.

    ZM

  • samhain10 - 5a
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hey, fullmoon13! That peachy salmony color is a favorite of mine, too. Yeah, this thread has a lot of good info, and I've been enjoying it. These other fanatics have actually got me growing two zinnias into the winter time just so I can squeeze a 2nd generation into the mix - ha! It is a bit addictive, so caution is advised. :)
    - Alex

  • fullmoon13
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Thanks for welcoming me and my flower friends to the thread. I also have tons of seeds saved of this years batch of zinnias, picked out the poofiest and most unique colored flowers to save seeds from, but I'm not real sure how to tell if they are fertile or not. Gotta do some more reading on hand pollinating since that will open up a world of fun. I am fighting mildew as well on just a few of the plants which seemed to get splashed too much by our barn's rain gutter. Definitely not going to be able to grow many in my greenhouse in the winter due to size, but I am inspired now to try at least a few with ZM's lighting hours recommendations, probably the candy cane stripe ones I just harvested this morning since they look festive. I've got about 3 gallon bags full of seeds saved for next year and we plan to do a field of them, since we have 22 acres to play around on. Really enjoyed that my chickens do not eat Zinnias and that they can outgrow weeds in height! Grasshoppers seem to love eating and living in the large zinnias (cherry queen I think) but left Lilliputs alone for the most part. This picture is pretty ridiculous...

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi fullmoon,

    Chuckle. That picture is a good close-up. And those grasshoppers are something else. I see a lot of grasshoppers on my zinnias, but they don't seem to do any real damage. Mostly, I think the grasshoppers eat grass and not zinnias, which is a good thing, considering how many grasshoppers we have.

    "... but I'm not real sure how to tell if they are fertile or not."

    You can pick zinnia seeds in two ways: Wait for the heads to mature and become brown and dry and pick the whole head and shuck it out and pick out the seeds. Or, you can pick the seeds when they are still green, but matured enough to have well developed embryos inside. It is actually easier to tell the fertile seeds from the "empty" ones when they are green. Notice that the petals themselves still have color.

    {{gwi:6263}} Be sure to dry your green seeds for a week or two before packaging them. Picking the seeds at the green stage has a couple of advantages: you save them from the seed-eating birds (finches and such) and you get them before they have had any water damage from wet weather. When you are picking out the seeds from a "shucked" brown seed head and you see a tiny root sticking out from the seed, it has germinated in the seed head, and is no longer viable. When you are picking out the brown seeds, you can squeeze a seed between your thumb and forefinger to tell if it is "fat" or "flat". If you are uncertain about a seed, you can gently try to bend it. If it bends easily, it is empty. A good seed will resist bending. An empty seed will bend easily. Don't bend too hard, you can break a good zinnia seed. It takes a little practice and experience, but it is possible to pick out a bunch of your own saved seeds that will have a high percentage of germination.

    I store a lot of my saved zinnia seeds in Snack sized Ziploc bags with a 3x5 card inside containing some notation about the seeds.

    {{gwi:20103}} That is an old picture, and I actually planted all of those seeds a couple of years ago. Zinnia seeds will keep for several years when stored at normal indoor conditions. You can extend that time by storing in a cool dry place.

    "I've got about 3 gallon bags full of seeds saved for next year and we plan to do a field of them, since we have 22 acres to play around on."

    Wow! With that much space, the sky is the limit. My total garden space, including my North Garden and my South Garden, is less than one third of an acre. Zinnia breeding is a numbers game. The more zinnias you can grow, the better your chances are of finding something good. And you can increase the odds in your favor by doing some cross pollinating.

    I don't know how you feel about bicolor and tricolor zinnias, but the Whirligigs were derived from an interspecific cross (between Z. violacea and Z. haageana) and even now they show a lot of variation because of that. You could purchase Whirligigs in bulk from Stokes Seeds and have a lot of seeds to plant that are already shucked. I purchased a quarter pound of Whirligig seeds from Stokes a few years ago, and I will just now be planting the last of them next Spring. I plan to devote my entire South garden (only about 1800 square feet) to Whirligigs next year.

    "Gotta do some more reading on hand pollinating since that will open up a world of fun."

    It is quite easy to cross-pollinate zinnias. In the morning the pollen is expressed freely in the pollen florets, which contain the anther bundles internally, and the stigmas are readily accessible at the base of the petals. If you prefer to transfer the pollen with a brush, simply touch the brush to a pollen floret to get some of the pollen on the tip of the brush. That takes only a few seconds to do.

    {{gwi:20104}} Then touch the brush to the stigmas that you want to pollinate. A single brush loading can pollinate several stigmas.

    {{gwi:20105}} Or you can use tweezers or forceps to pick a pollen floret and use the floret itself as a pollen-bearing brush.

    {{gwi:20106}} And simply rub that floret against the stigmas that you want to pollinate.

    {{gwi:20107}} Regardless of whether you prefer to use an artist's brush, tweezers, twissors, or forceps to pick up the pollen, the pollen florets and stigmas are relatively large, easy to see, and easy to get at. You can pollinate a lot of zinnia stigmas in only a few minutes.

    We want to hear more about your gardening plans. And if you have any questions, feel free to ask.

    ZM
    (not associated with any product or vendor mentioned or linked)

    This post was edited by zenman on Wed, Sep 24, 14 at 23:42

  • woodnative
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    I love these threads and the unique zinnias you guys are producing. No deliberate breeding yet here but just want to mention zinnias still blooming well here in nj that were started from seed before frost in a pot inside and planted out in May.

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi woodnative,

    Your zinnias are in better shape than some of mine. I am fighting powdery mildew here, much worse than usual for me.

    Some of your zinnias look quite tall. There might still be time for you to make a few experimental cross pollinations to get some hybrid seed that you could start indoors early next Spring. From the time of a successful cross pollination, you can have a reasonably mature green seed in about three weeks. And in my experience, a killing frost does not kill the green seeds. You could harvest a few green seeds and dry them for a week or two and give them a try next Spring. Just a suggestion. No pressure.

    I have been doing some cross pollinations and self pollinations this morning, and I will continue doing that into the afternoon. I have some specimens that I particularly want to get some green seeds from for my indoor Winter zinnia growing project. Welcome to this message thread.

    ZM

  • Irie.Island.Farmer
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hey everybody. Lovin the pictires. I live on an island in southwest florida and ive been growing these zinnias here for two years and they do so well here, bring good bugs and pollinators for my veggies. These seeds my dad sent me from Nebraska where he grows them every year since I was a kid so 20 something years, and my dad got the seeds from my great grandpa who grew them on his farm since the 50's . I will always have zinnias around as they bloom all year here!

  • samhain10 - 5a
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hold the phone - elder brother C1xS6 is budding!!! Zenman - this seems too early. It's about a foot tall (the younger one is an inch or more shorter), and it has at least 10 sets of true leaves, though some of those are side shoots. And now there is a little bud started - a little smaller than a pencil eraser. Didn't notice it until I was carrying the kids in from sunbathing this afternoon. They were out for several hours. The weather has been just too good to not take advantage of.

    Anyway, it's going to be agonizing waiting for that blossom.
    Hey, woodnative and Irie.Island.Farmer - join the party! Yep, zinnias are still blooming here as well - we haven't had frost yet amazingly enough. But to have them blooming all year around - holy moly. There you go, ZM - you didn't move far enough south. :)

    - Alex

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Welcome, Irie.Island.Farmer,

    We really envy your ability to grow zinnias year-round. Most of us are anticipating a possible killing frost in maybe two weeks or so.

    " These seeds my dad sent me from Nebraska where he grows them every year since I was a kid so 20 something years, and my dad got the seeds from my great grandpa who grew them on his farm since the 50's . "

    That is absolutely fascinating !!! Those seeds are, in effect, a family heirloom. I can see how you might hesitate to cull any of them, but when you are saving zinnia seeds, you do have the right to choose your favorites to save seeds from.

    This is entirely up to your discretion, but you could add to your zinnia gene pool by purchasing some zinnias of a different variety or varieties of your choosing. Your year-round growing season presents a powerful opportunity to do some zinnia breeding on your own. I always suggest the Whirligig strain from Stokes Seeds as one starting point, because it has such a wide range of zinnia variations. Whirligigs are from a line of interspecific hybrids between Z. violacea (elegans) and Z. haageana, so they have a greater potential for variation than zinnia strains that are derived from just Z. violacea.

    I tend to be attracted to spectacular variations like the tubular petaled mutation and the star-tipped mutation, but I am also becoming more sensitive to subtle variations, like this current specimen.

    {{gwi:20108}} It is essentially just a cactus flowered zinnia, and could appear in a commercial seed packet. As it happens, it does have some distant Whirligig ancestry, and I tend to credit the Whirligigs for that. This specimen does differ from the "average" a bit, by having longer, narrower, straighter petals, and it has a look that I have named as "linear" because of that petal shape. I am treating this specimen, and several similar ones, as breeder zinnias. I hope to eventually develop a separate strain of these big "linear" flowered zinnias in a complete range of colors.

    Just by looking over the zinnias that you have, you can see subtle variations, and some not-so-subtle variations, that you can form your own opinion of, and use your opinions to guide which zinnias you save seeds from. I think of those contemplative observations as some of my "zen" moments and, for me, they are an important dimension of the "fun" that I get from growing and breeding zinnias.

    Incidentally, your year-round situation means that you could use the green seed technique that has been described in these message parts as a means of "speeding up" your next generation of zinnias. You could even plant zinnia embryos instead of seeds, as some of us have done.

    If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask. In a public forum like this, you always have the advantage of getting a second and a third opinion on things.

    ZM

  • samhain10 - 5a
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    ZM - as you know, I'm partial to the cactus form, so this cactus-y pic you've just posted is beautiful to me. My own particular focus will be on wider petals, but with angular tips like many of the cactus, rather than the more rounded spoon-shape petals. But, since I'm just starting out with the hybridizing, who knows what the future may bring?

    Just repotted the two hybrid plants this morning into 6-1/2" clay pots, as they both had roots starting to come out of the drain holes again. They both had nice well-developed root systems when I knocked them out of the smaller pots. The larger one is 13-1/2" tall; the shorter is about 12-1/2".

    Possibly they will need repotting again during this indoor experiment. I have a couple more sizes of the clay pots, though, so that's OK. Oh, and both have buds now. I guess this may be due to the scabious rather than the cactus genes - the fact that they're already setting buds.

    - Alex

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi Alex,

    Your indoor experiment is going better than I expected. Perhaps those trips out into the great outdoors are very beneficial for your experimental zinnias. I am very close to re-starting my indoor zinnia project. Last year at this time I was very confident that I could control all insect pests using the systemic Imidacloprid. Now that I have seen Imidacloprid fail miserably to control thrips, I am approaching this indoor zinnia project with much less confidence. But, for sure, it is going to be a learning experience, and I always look forward to learning.

    I am trying to guess what the flowers on your two brave little hybrid zinnias are going to look like. Predicting the results of crossing zinnias is something I am not good at. Zinnias have a way of surprising me. That's why I frequently say that zinnias are full of surprises.

    You published good pictures of both the "mama" and the "papa" of your cross, so we look forward with anticipation to see what the cross will produce.

    "Oh, and both have buds now. I guess this may be due to the scabious rather than the cactus genes - the fact that they're already setting buds. "

    Your "mama" zinnia is a single bicolored yellow with a white base bloom, with no sign of pollen florets in the picture. When I see bicolored petals, I tend to think Whirligig. I suppose the "mama" could be scabious, but there is some uncertainty in my mind about that. In any case, the parents of your cross differ considerably, so the appearance of your F1 hybrid is a matter for speculation. This is one of my current breeders that combines the properties of both yellow based non-yellow and a lavender color.

    {{gwi:20109}} So, that is my prediction of what your little guys will look like when they bloom. You can take that with a very large grain of salt, because I am almost always wrong about the results of zinnia crosses. I blame that on "zinnias are full of surprises". I do hope your little guys survive to the blooming stage. Considering all the "slings and arrows" that indoor zinnias face, that is not a certainty. But the suspense grows.

    ZM

  • queen_gardener
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hiya, haven't been able to keep up on the reading but will sit down and read what I've missed since the four posts after mine :-)
    I had a question - ever heard of Canary Yellow Zinnias? I was thinking of buying some from an independent home-grower. I'm sure they're zinnias, they look like zinnias in the pic. I've just never seen them before, which obviously wouldn't be anything unusual, since I'd never seen the scabious type before this year . . .
    So what else am I missing out on??? What are some unusual types/colors out there I can easily get my hands on? I hope to be growing some interesting zinnia flowers after next year's harvest!
    Thanks!!!

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hello Queen-Gardener,

    Yes, I have heard of Canary Bird yellow zinnias. They are an old heirloom variety. The Bodger Seeds company introduced the dahlia flowered strain of zinnias in 1919, and it consisted of 18 separate colors, one of which was Canary Bird yellow. I don't think that all 18 cultivars have survived to the present, but Canary Bird was a nice yellow that has survived, and is available from several commercial sources.

    "So what else am I missing out on??? What are some unusual types/colors out there I can easily get my hands on?"

    Well, most seed companies now offer seeds online, and if you don't mind online shopping, there is a very large variety of zinnias available to you. To get some idea of what is available, I suggest you go to Hazzard's Seeds and type zinnia into their Search box window. That will bring up the first of many pages of zinnia seed offerings.

    And, of course, there are many other companies that offer a large selection of zinnias, like, for example, Johnny's Selected Seeds, who offer a good selection of zinnia seeds suitable as cut flowers for home use or for sale to florists.

    Johnny's is one of several companies who cater to Market Garden Growers who grow acreages of zinnia blooms for sale to the florist industry. Many of those growers prefer to plant zinnia seeds with mechanical seed planters, and some of those growers prefer to buy special coated or pelleted zinnia seeds, because they work better in the mechanical planters. A few of the mechanical planters work reasonably well with non-pelleted seeds, although every now and then some double and triple placement of smaller zinnia seeds will occur.

    I actually considered getting a mechanical planter, but decided that my zinnia seeds varied enough from the usual to make that a questionable thing to do. So I still plant my zinnia seeds in open furrows the "old fashioned way", by feeding them one-seed-at-a-time down an aluminum tube from an attached seed hopper. That way, it is up to me to "singulate" my zinnia seeds. ("Singulate" is an actual word that the mechanical planter people use.)

    We welcome your questions and comments, and would like to hear more about your zinnia plans.

    ZM
    (not associated with any product or vendor mentioned or linked)

  • queen_gardener
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    I get the Johnny's catalogue now, but I'll check into Hazzard's - I'd never heard of them.
    Starting when I was a kid, I loved to thumb through the Burpee catalogue my mom got every year. Still do! I signed up to get a bunch of catalogues this summer, so I'll be seeing them roll in . . . perfect for a wintry day!!!!!
    Thanks! Happy harvesting!

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi Queen-Gardener,

    Burpee was also the main catalog we used during my childhood on the farm. We also got Shumway's catalog. I grew some Banana Melons from Shumways. When Burpee was headed by W. Atlee Burpee and even later by his son David Burpee, Burpee was active in plant breeding and growing their own seeds. In the 60's and 70's Burpee offered some great zinnias, including the Luther Burbank strain, and ending in the series of F1 hybrid cactus zinnias called "Zenith".

    That was a good name for them, because that was about the high point for Burpee, who started going downhill and faced bankruptcy along about 2000. Ball bought Burpee to save them from bankruptcy and extinction, so now Ball is the parent company of Burpee.

    But now Burpee is just a shadow of their former selves. Sadly. I still buy zinnia seeds from them every year, but I won't be able to buy separate colors of either Burpeeana Giants or Zenith F1 hybrids like I could in the past. And the shrinking continues -- Burpee Hybrid zinnias have now been discontinued, at least on their online site and in their print catalog. I guess it is no longer profitable to pioneer new zinnia varieties. Maybe private zinnia growers have now inherited that function. Who knows?

    Incidentally, is Parks Seeds one of the catalogs you get?

    ZM

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi Alex,

    It was cold here this morning, and blustery windy from the north. Not freezing yet, but might as well be. I actually planted a few indoors green seeds last night. So my indoor zinnia project is now active.

    Here is another possible prediction for your hybrid embryo guys:

    {{gwi:20110}} And another one.

    {{gwi:20111}} Well, now that my indoor zinnia project is going, I have a bunch of pots that need washing. More later.

    ZM

  • samhain10 - 5a
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Queen Gardener - absolutely LOVE looking through all the catalogues in the winter and dreaming of spring. And next spring will be even more exciting as I grow some of the hybrid seeds I crossed myself. The anticipation! - what will they look like?

    ZM - now you really shouldn't get my hopes up like that - it's cruel! What you've posted is wa-a-ay more fancy that I think I have a right to expect on the first generation - or so you've warned me in the past!

    Also, you're probably right that I switched my scabious with my whirligigs, and everything I'm thinking is scabious is whirligig and vice versa. Sigh. Well, what the heck - I'm starting fresh with this next generation, my first F1 troop.

    Interesting stuff about Burpees - I never buy from them anymore because mostly they seem too expensive for the stuff I want. Though I do always peruse the catalog just in case there's something super special that I feel I must have. Hasn't happened in a long time. More than once they've tempted me with plants which they don't offer seeds for. I would have purchased the seed, but not so interested in paying for a single plant unless I'm standing in a nursery with the plant right in front of me. I break my own rules sometimes - year before last I did order several plants out of a few different specialty catalogs. :)

    Yes - cold, windy and wet here, too. Not much left to do in the garden except clean-up. Have harvested most foods except root crops and cabbage, and have pulled someting like a gazillion zinnia seeds which are either packaged already or still sitting in cups drying. Think I'm done harvesting there as well.

    Looking forward to hearing about everyone's indoor zinnia escapades this winter. And on that note, here is a visual update on the boys:

    {{gwi:20112}}

    We are growing happily under our new lights. The towel behind them is to block daylight, as I have switched them over to lights on at night and off during the day. Plus it maybe reflects some of the light back at them. I think I have a more reflective piece of posterboard I could put up...hmmm...

    And a close up of the tip burn - a product of their last outdoor excursion. Not esthetically pleasing, but not particularly health threatening. The adolescent plant equivalent of multiple piercings and tattoos. They think they look more badass now. Yo, dudes.

    {{gwi:20113}}

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi Alex,

    "What you've posted is wa-a-ay more fancy that I think I have a right to expect on the first generation - or so you've warned me in the past! "

    Well, admittedly my pictures are of recombinant advanced generation specimens, but your seedlings look good and, as always, there is that anticipation about what the opening zinnia buds will look like.

    "And a close up of the tip burn - a product of their last outdoor excursion. Not esthetically pleasing, but not particularly health threatening. The adolescent plant equivalent of multiple piercings and tattoos. They think they look more badass now. Yo, dudes. "

    Chuckle. That tip burn is a common occurrence in container grown zinnias. However, their last outdoor excursion is probably not the cause. It is more likely a nutrient deficiency, with the most probable cause being a calcium deficiency. The solution is to provide a little soluble calcium in the water that you water them with. (You could also foliar feed them with some dilute soluble calcium.) Some water supplies with "hard water" have enough dissolved calcium to supply the needs of your plants, but zinnias are heavy feeders on all of the plant nutrients and, as the linked article says, the budding stage is likely to "steal" calcium from nearby leaves, causing the tip burn symptoms.

    You could consider the measures suggested in the article. However, I have experienced calcium deficiencies in all of my indoor grown plants (zinnias, other ornamentals, and veggies) in Premier Pro-Mix BX at about the 4-week or 5-week stage. That is when the calcium supply in my Pro-Mix gets "used up".

    So I routinely include some calcium nitrate along with the other soluble nutrients that I water my indoor plants with. Your situation may be somewhat different, depending on the potting mix you are using.

    When growing in a sterile soil-free medium like Pro-Mix, I am in effect practicing a form of hydroponics, in which the Pro-Mix serves primarily as a hydroponic substrate. So I water my pots with what is essentially the same as would be used in a hydroponic setup. Hydroponic growers almost always add some Calcium nitrate to their water. If there is a hydroponic supply store in your area, they most likely can sell you some calcium nitrate.

    Incidentally, calcium is not a "trace element", plants use quite a lot of it. Not quite as much as the classic N-P-K elements, but way more than the trace elements like magnesium, iron, manganese, copper, zinc, molybdenum, boron, nickel, and cobalt.

    If you don't have a convenient supply of calcium nitrate in your area, you can purchase it (and other plant nutrients) from an online supplier of hydroponic nutrients. One convenient source is Amazon. A pound of Calcium nitrate will last you for years of indoor growing. If you start spraying your tomatoes, peppers, etc. with it outside, it will go rather fast.

    We had a frost warning for last night. I covered some of my newer zinnias using my hoops and fabric. It may have been a false alarm, as uncovered zinnias seem to have survived.

    This is another of my "linear" series of zinnias.

    {{gwi:20114}} I planted a few more zinnia green seeds in my 3.25-square pots last night. I will be busy today getting my indoor gardening jump started.

    ZM
    (not associated with any product or vendor mentioned or linked)

  • samhain10 - 5a
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Oooo - like that one. Hope some of my babies in the future look similar.

    Thanks for the tip about the calcium nitrate - sounds like something I should invest in. I'm thinking, as well, that I need to do some serious amendments to the soil this coming spring. I used to be such a committed composter, but life got too busy to keep up with it. Maybe I will be able to do more of that next year when I supposedly "retire". Yeah, right. Well, I can try. :)

    - Alex

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi Alex,

    "Thanks for the tip about the calcium nitrate - sounds like something I should invest in. "

    Another thing you should invest in is a small bottle of Boric Acid powder the next time you think of it, and are in a drug store. Zinnias usually become deficient in Boron in containers (and pots) and they can get insufficient Boron in some outdoors in-ground environments. But for the time being, we are just concerned with container/pot conditions.

    The objective of the small bottle of Boric Acid powder is that we will want to have 0.25 ppm of elemental Boron in the nutrients that you water your zinnias with and, if you are just watering without soluble nutrients, it is still a good idea that the "plain" water also have 0.25 ppm of Boron. After you get the Boric Acid powder, I will go into the details of making a stock solution of Boric Acid and how much of that stock solution to add to each gallon of water that you provide to your zinnias. It is important not to get too much Boron in the plant water -- 2.5 ppm of Boron will cause definite toxicity symptoms.

    In the past I have made serious nutritional mistakes by basing the composition of my nutrients on target tissue sample analysis data for zinnias. Bad mistake. A couple of years ago I killed some outdoor breeder zinnias with an overdose of Manganese Chelate based on tissue sample data for zinnias, and I think that was a "teachable moment" for me. The tissue sample data can tell you about possible deficiencies, but it does not relate to good nutrient solution compositions. In retrospect, I should have known that.

    However, the 0.25 ppm for Boron is a good nutritional value. In the absence of a laboratory balance, I will convert from gravimetric to volumetric data, so that we can deal with teaspoons, cups, and gallons.

    Gardening can involve a good deal of chemistry. This is an online publication that you might find interesting. More later.

    ZM

    This post was edited by zenman on Sun, Oct 5, 14 at 23:14

  • samhain10 - 5a
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    ZM - just a quick note before I have to go: we actually already have boric acid which we use periodically for ants coming in the kitchen during the summer. I think of it as low-key poison - didn't imagine it might be good for plants. Also, have put in an order with our friendly neighborhood hardware for some calcium supplement in the form of Bonide Blossom End Rot Stop. He didn't have anything in his catalog that was specifically Calcium Nitrate, just some 50 lb bags of Calcium Chloride (!). Anyway, the Bonide stuff says it's for calcium deficiency, and I decided to go ahead and order from our local guy instead of Amazon. It should work, don't ya think?

    Later - Alex

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi Alex,

    The Bonide Blossom End Rot Stop is most likely Calcium chloride. Which is the same stuff in 50 lb bags used to melt ice in the Winter. Chlorine is actually a necessary trace element for plants, but they need it in such small quantities that there is always enough of it available as an environmental contaminate.

    Different plants have different tolerances for salt (sodium chloride) before it becomes phytotoxic. And I think that is also true of Calcium chloride. Hydroponics growers would never use Calcium chloride because of its phytotoxicity. I use Calcium nitrate for that reason. Incidentally, some people avoid using Calcium chloride as an ice melter for the same reason -- that it can be phytotoxic to plants.

    The Boric Acid in the ant killer has been treated to make it stick to the bodies of ants that walk through it. It isn't the same product as the pharmaceutical grade sold in drug stores. However, if you can get it to go into solution in water, it should work. I think you will find that the ant killer boric acid tends to float around on the top of the water. You might do a little experiment to see if that is the case.

    Even the pharmaceutical grade Boric Acid is very slow to dissolve in cold water. To speed that up, I put a coffee cup with tap water in it in the microwave for one minute to heat it up, and pour that hot water in an empty drinking water bottle and add a quarter teaspoon of boric acid powder to that, screw the lid on and shake it up to get the boric acid to go into solution.

    Incidentally, I use a marker to label that bottle as boric acid as a precaution against someone using the bottle to hold drinking water again. If you can get your ant killer to go into solution, then it should work fine as a trace source of nutrient Boron for plants.

    There will be a little issue with whether a quarter teaspoon of the ant killer contains the same amount of Boron as a quarter teaspoon of drug store boric acid powder, but that equivalency should be, as they say, "close enough for government work." More later.

    ZM

  • samhain10 - 5a
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    So, how much water are you dissolving the 1/4 tsp boric acid in?

  • mister_guy
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    I was going to suggest blackstrap molasses as a calcium and micronutrients supplement, but Zenman got so TECHNICAL....

  • samhain10 - 5a
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Could I have that with pancakes, please?

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi Alex,

    "So, how much water are you dissolving the 1/4 tsp boric acid in?"

    I am dissolving the 1/4 tsp of boric acid in about a cup of hot water, just to get it into solution. The exact amount of water in the initial dilution doesn't matter.

    But that amount of water, whatever it is, is added to a one gallon container and filled with water to produce one gallon of water containing 1/4 teaspoon of Boric Acid. That is the stock solution. It should be labeled as such, and put out of the reach of children.

    Tomorrow we will calculate how much of the stock solution gets added to a gallon of plant water in order to get the target strength of 0.25 ppm of elemental Boron in the plant water. That may get a bit "technical". More later.

    ZM

  • samhain10 - 5a
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    ZM - I'll be waiting. Meanwhile, I think I'm gonna make pancakes...

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi Alex,

    Pancakes are yummy. But rather than try to calculate how yummy they are, I will return to the Boron and zinnias thing. First, I will try to provide some solid justification for the 0.25 ppm elemental Boron figure. That figure appears several places on the Web, but I think the basis for it is this study by Redington and Peterson. All we can see on that page is the Abstract, but that is sufficient, as it provides this statement.

    "Boron was investigated as the possible cause of bud blasting and non-development in Zinnia elegans. Blasting is characterized by a blackening of the developed bud as a result of necrosis of the scales, unopened calyx and enclosed tissue. Plants were subjected to boron levels of 0, 0.0025, 0.025, 0.25 and 2.5 ppm. Plants grown without added boron and at the lowest level supplied showed extreme new leaf chlorosis, thickening and distortion of older leaves, stunted growth and abnormal flower development including blasting. Plants grown at 0.025 ppm level showed moderate chlorosis and, to a slight extent, the other deficiency symptoms. Plants were healthiest when grown at the 0.25 level of boron. Boron at 2.5 ppm produced plants with marginal leaf necrosis, reduced height and root weight, and slower flowering when compared to the 0.25 treatment level. Analysis of boron in plant tissue confirmed that decreased levels of boron in the medium resulted in decreased levels of boron in various plant tissues." The bold emphasis was provided by me, because that is the justification for the 0.25 ppm Boron target.

    I provide elemental Boron via boric acid, and that is the main ingredient of the insecticide you have on hand. The chemical formula for boric acid is H3BO3. Wikipedia provides this information about boric acid.

    From which we glean that its molecular weight is 61.83302 and the fraction of elemental B to boric acid is 10.811 / 61.83302 = 0.1748 rounded to four figures.

    There are 4.92892 milliliters in a teaspoon, so our 1/4 teaspoon of boric acid in the gallon of stock solution is 1.23223 ml.

    Next comes a tricky part, converting that volume of boric acid into a weight of Boron. Wikipedia gave the density of pure Boric acid as 1.435 grams per cc, which is considerably more dense than water. But that figure is for the solid material and we have a powder, which includes quite a bit of entrained air. If you drop a quarter teaspoon of boric acid into water, you will notice that the "glob" floats. I eliminated the surface tension of water as the explanation by replacing the water with some water to which a small amount of Dawn dishwashing liquid was added. Same result. The glob of boric acid powder continued to float, admittedly quite low in the water.

    If I had a laboratory balance, the simple solution would be to drop 1/4 teaspoon of boric acid powder onto the scale and see how much it weighed. That would give us a good figure for the density of the powder as well as the weight of boric acid powder and, by multiplying by the 0.1748 factor, the mass of elemental Boron in the gallon of stock solution.

    I will probably purchase an inexpensive laboratory scale in the future (I am curious what some of my zinnia seeds weigh, and I have several trace element chelate powders that I need to weigh). But for the time being, I will make an estimate for the density of my boric acid powder. The glob floated rather low in the water, so, for the time being, I will use an estimate (guess) of 0.9 for the specific gravity of my boric acid powder. So, with that estimate, we can calculate:

    1/4 teaspoon = 1.23223 ml x 0.9 g/ml = 1.109007 grams of Boric acid in the gallon of stock solution. And multiplying that by the weight ratio (0.1748) of elemental Boron to Boric acid, gives us an estimate of 0.1939 grams of elemental Boron in the one gallon of stock solution.

    We note that accepting that 1 ml of water weighs 1 gram and assuming that our stock solution density does not vary significantly from that, we can say:

    1 US gallon = 3.7854 liters = 3785.4 ml = 3785.4 grams. Therefore we can say that our stock solution contains
    0.1939 grams elemental Boron per 3785.4 grams of solution, which amounts to 5.1223 x 10-5 grams B per gallon.

    We want the concentration of Boron in the plant water to be the target value of 0.25 grams Boron per 1,000,000 grams of plant water. Let's do a little algebra, and let y represent the grams of elemental B in a gallon of plant water. So lets equate that concentration to the target concentration.

    y / 3785.4 = 0.25 / 1000000

    Solving that equation for y:

    y = 0.25 x 3785.4 / 1000000 = .00094635 grams of Boron in a gallon of plant water.

    Now lets solve algebraically for the amount of stock solution, S, needed to supply that much elemental Boron.

    .000051223 grams B per gram of stock x S = .00094635 grams B

    S = .00094635 / .000051223 = 18.475 grams of stock solution per gallon of plant water

    Assuming that the density of stock solution doesn't vary much from the density of pure water, lets convert 18.475 grams of stock solution to a more useful form.

    18.475 grams x ( 1 gallon / 3785.4 grams ) x (16 cups / gallon) = .07809 cups

    Its not practical to use that small a fraction of cups, so let's convert that to tablespoons.

    .07809 cups x (16 tablespoons / cup ) = 1.249 tablespoons

    So, if I haven't made some kind of stupid mistake, the target Boron level in the plant water is achieved by including only about 1.25 tablespoons or 3.75 teaspoons of stock solution in a gallon of plant water. And that is subject to how well my estimate of 0.9 specific gravity for the Boron powder fits reality. If these results are reasonably correct, I have been overdosing my zinnias by a factor of 2 or 3 on Boron. Fortunately, I would have to overdose them by a factor of 10 to see the phytotoxicity reported in the Redington and Peterson reference.

    I have convinced myself that I need some sort of little weighing device. I'm sure glad this message didn't get "technical". Now I have a craving for pancakes.

    ZM

    This post was edited by zenman on Wed, Oct 8, 14 at 23:48

  • samhain10 - 5a
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    ZM - Believe it or not, there have been times when I can really enjoy doing those sorts of calculations. However, I didn't try to do the math this time to check you; I'll take you at your word that you've worked this out properly. If my plants die, of course, you're toast. :) Anyway, to cut to the chase - you're making a stock boric acid solution in a gallon of water, and then cutting it again by adding 3.75 tsp of that solution to make up another gallon of watering stock - do I have that right? To which I might add whatever other fertilizer or supplements (Miracle Gro, etc.) - or is there some hazard mixing other things with the boric acid solution - things binding that shouldn't, don'cha know?
    I'm with you about getting a decent scale - can't count the number of times I've wanted one for various projects. BTW, once upon a distant time, I worked as a lowly medical tech. Never got to use the electron microscope, but I did get to work in a clean room. Which is more than I can say now. Heh heh...

    - Alex

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi Alex,

    "Anyway, to cut to the chase - you're making a stock boric acid solution in a gallon of water, and then cutting it again by adding 3.75 tsp of that solution to make up another gallon of watering stock - do I have that right?"

    Yes. And as I improve my figure for the density of my Boric Acid powder, I will leave the stock solution at 1/4 teaspoon per gallon, at least for the time being, and simply "tweak" the 3.75 tsp per the improved density figure.

    "To which I might add whatever other fertilizer or supplements (Miracle Gro, etc.) - or is there some hazard mixing other things with the boric acid solution - things binding that shouldn't, don'cha know?"

    Yes, you can add Miracle-Gro or whatever. However, Miracle-Gro contains some Boron, so I should calculate how much that is and revise the 3.75 tsp figure for the Boron stock solution. It will be interesting if the Miracle-Gro is already providing enough Boron, although I suspect it isn't enough for zinnias, because I have seen Boron deficiency symptoms when using Better-Gro, which also has some Boron. (I don't use Miracle-Gro indoors because of its urea content.) The thing is, zinnias need more Boron than typical plants, and zinnia Boron deficiencies are common in nutrient programs that would be fine for most plants. The Boron plant water is so dilute that precipitation problems aren't a problem when mixing with other things.

    The same dilute mixing principle applies for Calcium nitrate (or Calcium chloride). Given that all plants need quite a lot of Calcium, you may wonder why there is no Calcium in Miracle-Gro or Better-Gro. It's a precipitation problem. If they added Calcium nitrate to Miracle-Gro, it would precipitate insoluble Calcium phosphate as soon as you added water, killing the Phosphorus nutrition of the product.

    However, if you dilute the Miracle-Gro to twice the normal strength, and also dilute the Calcium nitrate to twice its needed strength, and then combine the two solutions, no Calcium precipitates out and each of the double strength solutions acts to complete the dilution of the other to the needed single strength.

    That same dilution principle applies to any situation when you are combining two or more stock solutions. Each stock solution added to the mix dilutes the other stock solution(s) in the mix, because they all have different active ingredients.

    "...but I did get to work in a clean room. Which is more than I can say now. Heh heh... "

    I'm pretty sure your room would qualify as a clean room when compared to my room. Maybe next Spring I will actually do some Spring cleaning. More later.

    ZM

    This post was edited by zenman on Thu, Oct 9, 14 at 0:52

  • zen_man
    Original Author
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Hi everyone,

    Since this message thread has become so long, we are continuing this over in It can be fun to breed your own zinnias - Part 28 for a fresh start.

    Hope to see you all over there.

    ZM