Re: Annual poppies & fertilizer?
- Subject: Re: Annual poppies & fertilizer?
- From: S*
- Date: Sun, 13 Jan 2002 09:43:21 -0800
At 03:14 PM 1/10/2002 -0800, Joe Seals wrote:
>...Also, I've never transplanted any of these species.
>I've always read that direct sowing is the only way to
>get successful, vigorous plants. Has anybody done any
>side-by-side tests?
I generally transplant them, although sometimes when we have an unusually
warm winter they self-seed. The self-seeded (direct sown) ones do *less*
well. We have colder winters than the Bay Area, so I assume that this is
due to the transplanted ones not having to contend with light frosts. Seed
catalogs always say that poppies are difficult to transplant, but I have
never found them to be more stressed by transplantation than anything
else. The catalogs often say the same thing about California poppies, but
for them it is not true in the extreme! Last summer I weeded out some
California poppies that had seeded into an area where I didn't want 'em --
I just pulled them up by the roots like you would any weed. Then it
occurred to me that I could put them in the yard of a rental house that I
was fixing up, so I cut off all their leaves (so they wouldn't lose
moisture) and just planted the bare tubers. This was in early summer, with
intense sun and not that much care. They did just fine. All of this is
entirely non-scientific, of course :-).
