Candy Cane Zinnias

[sheepdog 10]

I am really pleased with the new variety of Zinnias I tried this year, the Candy Cane mixed colors. I actually got the seed from someone at the swap meet that had a whole big box full of outdated seed selling it cheap, so I was actually just glad that it grew to start with. You never know with old seed how it will do. Sometimes you get lucky, and in most cases, you buy it cheap enough if it doesn't come up you haven't lost much to start with. I would highly recomend this variety to anyone interested in flower landscaping and gardening. They are a pretty mix of color on each individual flower. They really hold up well after blooming, the flowers seem to stay pretty and last and last without wilting down like most flowers that fade just days after blooming. Since I am saving them for seed, I have been watching for the blooms to fade so I know the seed will be mature and viable for next year. Because of that, I have noticed with this variety a very intersting thing I've never known of any kind of flower to do before. It seems that the original bloom stays, but in the center of the flower, new bright colored flower petals continue to sprout out of the original flower bloom. I'll put a picture below of one of the flowers with just the first few new petals coming out of center. In this next picture, you can see one of the blooms that has developed a full and complete center flower, you can just still barely see the older, and still fairly nicely colored and unfaded bloom around the outer edges of the new bloom. I really think these flowers are just amazing.While I was out taking pictures this morning, I thought I should go ahead and take one for you guys of my main flower bed. It's 194 feet long, so getting it all in a good picture isn't so easy. The Cosmos has really gone wild and is blooming like crazy. Just too bad it waited till so late in the growing season to start making a showing. You can also see two of my cane patches that I started a few years ago, on the right side of the picture, near the beginning of the flower bed, and the other smaller one down at the end of the driveway, on the left. It's a lot smaller patch, and has never grown as well due to the very poor quality soil, or should I say lack of soil, it's mostly rock and clay down there. Of course, our Schnauzer had to get in the picture.