what is successfully grown from seed

Greetings:

For some years now, I have been growing flowers from seed, perennials as
well as annuals;  this past year I ordered my seeds from a Canadian grower,
as I live in NY State zone 5, and we get a frost sometimes in the middle of
September, and sometimes still get a frost in early June, so I figured if it
grows well in Canada...

Last year I grew feverfew, foxglove, pinks, lavender, veronica, from seed; 
the foxglove didn't flower until this year, and has been very nice; now
let's hope it self-seeds the way it's supposed to;
the lavender is bigger this year than last, and has a few flowers, but I
know this will take another year or so to really start looking like something;
the feverfew and the pinks were really successful, and the veronica looks
good but hasn't flowered yet this year;

this year I grew aruncus, thalictrum, penstemon, lobelia cardinalis, lychnis
coronaria, more lavender, salvia, aquilegia, gaillardia, perovskia, all
gotten from the Canadian grower;
I had a very hard time getting the gaillardia to sprout, and got only about
7 plants, which have not yet gotten blossoms;
the lychnis was also reluctant at first to sprout, but then did all right,
and about 12 plants have survived; I don't expect this to bloom this year;
the aruncus resulted in about 12 plants, which are very small, so probably
they won't do anything this year;
the thalictrum were in the refrig until early June, and are very small even
now, but there were about 18 seedlings put into the ground;
the penstemon were among the most successful, there must have been at least
18 plants to put into the ground, but they haven't shown any blossoms yet;
as I wrote yesterday, one (1) lobelia survived, and doesn't look as if it
will do anything this year;
the salvia were also very successful, lots of plants, getting very big now,
but no blossoms yet;
three aquilegia sprouts survived, doing not much yet;
three perovskia survived, also very small yet.

There is a perennial farm nearby, and she charges $1.75 for good-sized
perennials, some multiples in a pot;  of course this is much better than the
greenhouse nursery, which charges $5.99 at least for perennials even when
they look dead, but with the arguable success of my efforts, I begin to
wonder whether I shouldn't save the electric and water, the supplies, the
time and trouble of growing from seed, and just buy them.

I would love to know what perennials are easy to grow from seed.  I know
there are webpages that will tell me, but sometimes I can't get my computer
to get them for me, and surely someone on this list knows what they are.

Isabelle Hayes

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