More foxglove stuff

In a message dated 6/10/00 3:46:09 PM Eastern Daylight Time, 
deanslgr@kode.net writes:

<< That's not necessarily a bad thing.  If they don't bloom this year, they'll
 bloom next year.  Ignore that "biennial" stuff. >>

Here, here, Dean.  You live in a tropical paradise compared to some of us.  
Biennial is a general term, I suppose.  The more accurate description is 
biennial and monocarpic.  This means the crown of the plant that flowers and 
forms seeds will not do so ever again.  Often the plant grow offsets as 
sempervivums do (hen and chicks).  The process is easier to see on semps but 
I believe it is quite the same.  The semp rosette that blooms will never 
bloom again, it will die soon after blooming but the clump lives on.

When digitalis blooms, that crown will not bloom again.  What is blooming is 
the newly minted offsets.  Treating a plant as a biennial, that is growing a 
new plant each late summer for bloom the next spring gives you a "sure 
thing".  I usually compost any clump of digitalis purpurea after it blooms.  
The offset plants are never as vigorous as new plants.  Since the ordinary 
digitalis/foxglove seeds around so freely new plants are always available.

If you are growing a named cv or some special seed you may elect to cut off 
the plants surrounding the original and bring them on.  The reason one writer 
did not have flowers from seed is that with one hybrid exception, no 
foxgloves bloom in the first year of growth.

Biennially grown plants are somewhat more work than perennials but reward the 
grower with a longer bloom season.  Additionally, some plants can behave as 
both annual, biennial and perennial, example: silene armeria.

I think there is some discussion on hollyhocks as well.  The hollyhock grown 
as a biennial will often give you a plant free of the familiar rust on all 
the older varieties.  With same year bloom hybrids and several terrific 
species now available, it may be difficult to judge what you have unless 
grown from seed. 

Claire Peplowski
East Nassau, NY z4

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