It depends on the flowers, and I grow a mix of heirlooms and hybrids.

I grow lots of wildflowers, and for them, my primary source is Wildseed Farms in Texas. (wildseedfarms.com) They sell single species seeds and and seed blends. I like the TX/OK blend, the Firecracker 123 blend, and the poppy blend.

For heirloom varieties of flowers, my favorite sources are Select Seeds Antique Flowers, Baker Creek and Southern Exposure Seed Exchange. Every now and then I get flower seeds from Territorial Seed or Nichols Garden Nursery, but am mindful of the fact that they are west coast seed companies and some of the varieties they sell are not necessarily well-suited to our climate (though many others are).

I like Wilhite Seeds, based in Poolville, TX, and find that everything I've ever purchased from them grows well here for me. SInce their focus is regional, they tend to carry only varieties of veggies, flowers and herbs that thrive in our climate.

For tomato seeds, Gleckler's Seedmen is my first choice because their heirloom varieties are true-to-type, and Victory Seeds is a very close second for the same reason. I also buy some tomato varieties (and other veggies, flowers and herbs) from Southern Exposure Seed Exchange, Tomatofest and Sample Seed Shop. The packets at Sample Seed Shop are smallish, so you can buy a lot of different varieties without spending a fortune. I am growing a lot of things this year from seed I purchased from Remy (a Garden Web member) at her company, The Sample Seed Shop.

Renee's Garden Seeds is one of my favorite seed companies. Renee's seeds are top quality, the seed packets are both beautiful and informative and they ship really fast. I especially like their multipacks that contain 2 or 3 varieties of seeds in one packet. For example, there might be three colors of zinnia seeds in a packet, or three kinds of mini-watermelons or three kinds or peppers. She dyes her seeds with non-toxic food coloring so that you can make sure you get some of each variety planted.

I love the large selection of flowers, veggies and herbs from Botanical Interests.

Honestly, I never met a seed company I didn't like, but the ones I listed above are my most favorite ones at the present time. I am a seedaholilc and always have a gazillion seeds more than I have time and space to plant them all.

Dawn

Here is a link that might be useful: Sample Seeds

Thanks Dawn. I don't know what I want..well, I do, my flowering bucket list is like 100 long, and that's alot to narrow down when I love them all. I want to stay more true to native flowers, think wispy, cottage style, free spirit. I don't want it to look like grandma's house where she has had the same plants for 30 years and they are all neatly manicured- no offense to anyone, its just not my thing.

Ones that attract hummers, butters are on the tops of my list. Once again, I am learning, and it really is a trial and error process. My ideas on gardening have changed as I have grown up.

So it sounds like Sample Seed might just be what I need. I want a variety without bulk and breaking the bank.

Pine Tree (superseeds) sends smaller amounts of seeds.

Have you ever done seed trading? I haven't in a few years, but it is a LOT of fun. I think amount of seeds is usually 25, if I remember correctly. I usually sent more than that. There are several forums here that will facilitate seed obsessions..uh, I mean trading. :)

The butterfly forum can give you a lot of ideas and Susan and Butterflymom (Sandy) are great Okie resources!

You might put up a list of seeds you are looking for. Some of us may have them :)

I ordered some from swallowtail seeds this morning. Hope they are ok. Suppose to ship tomorrow. Free shipping on 30 dollar purchase. Anyone else ever used them.

I have ordered many times from Swallowtail Seeds. They are great.

Swallowtails seeds is an excellent source, and here are some more.

This time of year, it is best to stick with warm season, or tender annuals. They will come up quickly, many can be direct sown, and annuals will complete their cycle from bloom to seed set in one season of growth so you can collect seed for next year to beef up those that drop on the ground and self sow.

Soon it will be time to think about perennials you might want to see in the garden next year, and winter sowing is such an easy way to get those beauties into your garden at little expense. Winter sowing is a way to mimick Mother Nature's cold temps, which most perennial seeds require to break dormancy (known as stratification). Winter sown perennials probably won't flower the first year from seed, but some do, but you can also winter sow hardy and half hardy annuals.

Hardy annuals include:

Larkspur
Hollyhock (some are biennial and will bloom following year)
Salvia (annuals, like Lady in Red)
Alyssum
Snapdragons
Poppies
Malva
Nicotiana
Cosmos
Sunflowers
Cleome
4 o'clock
Dianthus
Pansies

Dill
Parsley
Cilantro
Borage

I've been sowing some of the heat lovers right now like zinnias - great flower power and the beneficial love them. Also seeds of morning glories, cosmos,
Sunflowers, marigolds, tropical milkweed for the Monarchs, Celosia, Gomphrena, purple hyacinth bean. It's getting a little late to start a lot from seed and expect to get a lot of flowering done before the season is over, so I've named the ones that grow faster from seed to flower in that timespan.

There is a Wintersowing Forum here if you're interested in checking it out. Gives you something to do to fight the winter blahs!

Oh, seed sources I've used are Prairie Moon, for native plant seeds, Hazzards for bulk flower seeds (great and HUGE variety), Swallowtail Garden Seeds,, Summerhill Seeds, Mountain Valley Seeds, J. L. Hudson, Select Seeds, Easy Wildflowes, and Ion Exchange. So are great sources.

Susan

I just went through my seed box yesterday and sowed a lot of seed, from a very wide variety of sources, to fill in areas where cool-season crops have been harvested.

I planted the following that will bloom by mid- to late-summer:

On the garden fence: Morning Glories (Heavenly Blue, Impomoea hederifolia var. lutea, and Kiyozaki Mix; Black-eyed Susan Vine (the regular golden-yellow one and Spanish Eyes which has shades of burnt red, salmon, pink and rose); moonflower vine, purple hyacinth bean and Mina Lobata.

In the empty spaces in beds: Globe Amaranth (Mardi Gras Parade from Renee's which has flowers in bright red, apricot orange and carmine), Zinnia (Queen Lime, Candy Cane mix, Carousel Mix and Aztec Sunset), and the seed of several kinds of salvia left over from other plantings. All of these generally sprout and grow fast in hot weather and most will be blooming by mid-July if not sooner. They can be amazingly fast to sprout and grow in hot weather as long as they get adequate moisture.

Then, in flats, I sowed the following. Some will bloom this year but some likely won't bloom until next year: Hibiscus syriacus mix (Rose of Sharon), Hibiscus Deep Pink (Swamp Rose Mallow), Hibiscus 'Mahogany Splendor' (grown for dark foliage), Lavatera trimestis (Rose Mallow), Rudbeckia (Cherry Brandy, Cappuccino, and Prairie Sun), and Melampodium 'Melanie'.

Succession plantings of veggies sowed yesterday to fill 'holes' left by the harvest of some crops: Watermelon 'Hime Kansen', Squash 'Teot Bat Put' (C.moschata), Early Bulam (C. pepo, so under floating row cover), green Armenian cucumber, green striped Armenian cucumber, and the following winter squash, all C. moschata types: Trombocino, Lunda di Napoli, Tonda Padana and Musquee de Provence.

I have oodles of zinnia and sunflower seeds reserved to plant in the current potato beds once the potatoes are harvested.

For anything I expect to bloom this summer or autumn, I try to get all the seeds in the beds no later than the Fourth of July weekend. Any seed planted after that is either perennial or biennial for blooms next year, or is cool-season for fall and winter blooms (ornamental cabbage and kale, pansies, violas, etc.), or I am taking a risk and hoping for blooms from late-sown flowers. One that does well even from a very late sowing is Castor Bean, but I grow it for the foliage, so I'm not waiting endlessly for flowers from it.

Plantings after early July are riskier in terms of getting flowers, but it all depends on when your first frost or freeze occurs in autumn. Some years at our house it has arrived as early as the last week in September and some years not until mid-December. It usually happens sometime in October or November though.One year all the flowers were blooming and gorgeous in late November and I thought they'd still be in bloom when my extended family came for Thanksgiving. On the Wed. morning before Thanksgiving, we awoke to a killing freeze and they all died. The next day, my aunt (who is a gardener) and I were out looking at the garden and I said something like "I had so many things I wanted you to see, but they all froze yesterday morning" and she pointed at the brown and black limp plants and said "I'm seeing them". Her sense of humor still cracks me up, and she's in her mid-80s, lol. Most years we don't still have warm-season plants in bloom that late, but my zinnias usually survive late frosts until a hard freeze (28 degrees) kills them.

In 2004, when they finished building our barn-style detached garage around July 7th, there was a lot of bare ground around it, heavily compacted by the use of heavy machinery. I didn't want to leave the ground bare since weeds would sprout, so I broadcast sowed many kinds of zinnias, sunflowers, gomphrena and verbena bonariensis and scratched them into the compacted ground with a garden rake. I watered lightly, and didn't have to water them any more because it was a wet year with rain falling regularly. I had blooms by about the third week in August. It was pretty amazing, but they don't always come into bloom that quickly. The conditions were cooler, wetter and milder than usual that July and August so I got away with planting a bit late.

I buy some things from Swallowtail and buy a lot of things from Summerhill. Both have great quality and ship very quickly. I only order from Hazzards when I want a LOT of something, but you sure cannot beat their prices.

I forgot to mention Richter's Herbs. I use them to order some of the less common herbs which aren't carried by the major seed houses.

I'd never stop sowing flower seeds in summer if it wasn't for the fact that the ones sown very late just won't get a chance to bloom.

In late fall, I sow wildflower seeds for spring bloom, including poppies, bluebonnets and larkspur.

Dawn, I've planted Giant Milkweed, Strawberry Fields Gomphrena, Bat Face Cuphea, Strawberry Spinach, Variegated Shoefly, and Malva Braveheart. Purple Baron Millet, and Purple Fountain Grass.

I saved seed of the Japanese Morning Glories I grew last year that were so beautiful, and have planted them around the garden, as well as many seeds of Cut & Come Again zinnias.

The pretzel beans are up as well as two of the tomatos, Chocolate Stripes and Indian Stripe. These may have a longer DTM than I might want, but I am starting early and maybe it won't get too horribly hot this year, lol! Thought I'd give them a try at least. I also planted more of New Big Dwarf, Gary'O Sena, Greek Rose, Bloody Butcher, Vorlon.

I also planted seeds of these tomato that I didn't originally start: Aussie, Kimberly, Mr. Bruno, Earl of Edgecomb, Large Red Cherry, Sweet Baby Girl, Early Rouge.

Maybe I'll get a few.

Susan

Thanks everyone!

Lisa- I would do trading, but I have nothing to trade for lol! I'd head over to the butterfly forum, but I am afraid my wish list would grow longer!

Susan- I don't think I will do anymore planting this year other then to replant the sunflowers with the few seeds I have left and pray that whatever is eating the heads off them will stop! As a Kansas girl, I need my sunflowers! Plus, they were suppose to distract the wildlife from my corn.

Mainly, I was thinking if I started collecting a few seed packets at time, now of the things I want, come time to plant, I would have them. Instead of making 1 giant purchase.

I have a dumb question. How do I collect the seeds on annuals? Say like, I have some African Daisies that I would love to see again next year without the $4 each price tag..how do I know if I can get seeds from them, and how do I do it?

So far, I have bought plants to do all my planting, as this was our 1st spring here, but it adds up really fast, and seeds seem cheaper. The perennials I have are all planted in ground and are:

Sage
Lavender
Yellow Yarrow
Pink Pampas
Candytuft
Citronella
Lobelia( I think, I'd have to go look to make sure)
Carnations(which are not doing too good, which is sad bc they smell divine!)
Live Forevers( I have no idea what they are really are, this is what I grew up calling them)
Grape Hyacinth
Coral Bells(not planted, potted, not sure what to do with them yet)

The annuals I have are all potted and are:
African Daisies
Pansy's
Impatiens
Superbena-Verbena Hybrid
Glads(not potted)
Osteospermum

Dawn- It sounds just lovely! All those colors! Black eyed Susan's where on my must plant list, but I never found any seeds, so I wait for next year I guess, or hurry and order some seeds! I won't grow Castor Bean around here, not with a Boxer that will eat anything and everything, and a couple of toddlers..it makes me too nervous, but the foliage is pretty!

I need a book that tells me how to do all this! How to have an endless blooming garden. Or maybe I will just toss random seeds around the ground and see what happens lol!

Seriously though, thanks everyone. I am learning, slowly but surely.

Bre, If you wait until late summer or early fall, many seed companies have great clearance sales. I'll post them here when I start getting the emails advertising the sales. I got tons of seeds last fall on sale, especially from Peaceful Valley Farm Supply and Renee's Garden Seeds. I think the PVFS seeds were on sale for $1 a pack and the Renee's may have been either 40 or 50 per cent off.

Except for the very newest seeds that don't even hit the retail sellers until winter or spring, I always have all my seeds for the next year purchased before Christmas of the current year, and sometimes I have them all purchased before Thanksgiving.

I didn't start growing Castor Bean until my son was in high school and our dogs normally are penned up in their dog yard where they cannot access any of the plants I grow. I tend to be very careful with potentially dangerous plants and plant parts. Even if I let the dogs out to play fetch-the-ball in the yard, the Castor Bean plants are not near the area where we play. I'd never grow something that potentially dangerous in an area where kids or pets could reach it. It is only the beans (seeds) of the plant that contain ricin, but I still am really careful. If I want to collect seeds from the plants, I put a nylon stocking over the big seedheads before the seedpods are mature and start to pop open and scatter the seeds. That stocking catches all the seeds instead of letting them scatter on the ground where a domestic pet, child or wildlife might find and eat them.

My dogs don't chew on many plants, but they love to dig up the soft soil in the raised beds and roll around in it, which explains why they are almost never ever allowed in the garden. Even when the garden gate is open and we are playing fetch nearby, they won't go into the garden because they know they shouldn't. We do have one dog, Duke, who seems to think green tomatoes are tennis balls, so I have to watch him when we're playing ball or he'll go pull a green tomato off one of the container plants on the patio. He doesn't eat green tomatoes....he just wants to play ball with them.

Susan, That's a nice bunch of seeds that you planted.

I need to start tomato seeds today for fall tomatoes. Really, I was going to do it yesterday, but when I opened up the seed box, I hit the flower section first and started planting flowers and never even made it to the tomato seeds.

Dawn

Alright, I keep seeing ya'll talking about fall tomatoes..do tell. Are they certain kinds? Do you keep them strictly in your green houses, or potted?

Dawn taught me the bulk of what I know about growing tomatoes. I just know from her that in selecting tomato varieties for a fall crop, it is best to choose those varieties with the least number of "day(s) to maturity"". Those with 70 DTM, or less, will, thus have the best chance of growing and producing fruit by the time we get our first freeze.

In Oklahoma, we can have two crops of tomatos. Spring planted tomatos and fall planted varieties. People around here, weather cooperating, often get their seeds started anytime from January to March; for plants to go in the ground anywhere from late March to April, depending on where you are located in the state. Fall tomatoes, with seeds planted in June, are usually ready to go out mid-July or so. There are some variables on these estimates such as weather, me getting off my ¿*¢€¿ to start seeds, what zone or region of Oklahoma you live in, like the northern or southern part of the state. Dawn usually gets her seeds started and tomatos set out in the garden a couple weeks or so before I do (if I'm on time, that is), because she lives wayyyyyyy down in southern Oklahoma. But me, I live in central oklahoma.

Our summers, and the last couple of years, our springs, have been excruciatingly brutal for the plants, not to mention the onslaught bugs and diseases that attack tomatos. Consequently, the plants are just worn slick by the time fall arrives with its cooler temps and more favorable conditions more conducive to fruit production. One way to continue having our favorite fruit is by growing fall tomatos. We just pray we have a nice, extended fall before a freeze wipes everything out. There are things to do to insure a longer season, like frost blankets, or simply covering the plants with blankets from the house,, picking all the green tomatos, and ways to ripen green tomatos, such as cutting down the entire plant and hanging it upside down to facilitate ripening. I'm sure you'll read about some "tricks of the trade" down the road a bit.

The main reason I am growing fall tomatos this year is because we had such a long, long, cold spring. My Tomatos outgrew their transplant pots, became leggy, lost leaves, and just went downhill on a fast train before I was able to get them in the ground or their permanent containers.

Anyway, that's a little bit of info on fall tomato planting, and Dawn will come by and correct all my erroneous statements, so you'll have an even better idea on the how's, why's,, what's, and when's. I am just a poor wee tomato noob!

I would encourage you to check out the winter sowing forum here because they have info on other seed sources where you can pick up seeds for like $1.00 a packet, and I think in fall they do free seeds to introduce newbies to the joys of winter sowing as well. Check it out!

Susan

Susan,

Great job!

Bre, You can grow any variety you want for fall. It is just, as Susan pointed out, that the varieties with shorter DTMs have the best chance of producing before fall's temperatures drop down close to freezing.

It is not mandatory, by any means, to start new plants for fall. Some people baby their plants through the worst heat we get here, which I believe tends to occur roughly from mid-July to mid-August, but it often is better to start with new plants. Trying to carry plants through the summer means that they already have suffered a lot of stress from heat, wind, pests and diseases. Fresher plants tend to produce better in fall, or at least that has been my experience when I have kept some spring plants going through the fall while also planting fresh new plants for fall.

It always astonishes me that the same tomato plants that are so drop dead gorgeous and loaded with fruit in May and June often look like they've been through the wringer by late July. People who live in urban and suburban areas may have better luck keeping tomato plants happy and healthy, but I find it is harder to do this in rural areas. When I lived in zone 8 Texas, I generally did not put in new plantings for fall. Here, I feel like I really need to, at least most years.

When you are in a rural to semi-rural area, if the open pasture, grassland, meadows or woodlands around you really dry up and turn lovely shades of brown and tan in the summer, where do the plant-eating bugs go? Answer: to every little oasis of green they can find, and in general, that means gardens and landscapes whose residents are irrigating them and keeping them green. I get pests in July and in August of some years that are unbelievable in terms of their quantity. Usually it is grasshoppers, blister beetles, spider mites, stink bugs and leaf-footed bugs that cause the most problems when they move into my garden in huge numbers in summer's hottest weather.

I start my fall tomatoes outdoors (they might as well learn to grow in the heat since that is exactly what they'll have to do) but as far away from any existing tomato plants as possible. Sometimes I start them on the patio, but this year I have two tomato plants in pots on the patio, so I guess this year I'll start them on the front porch, which is a large east- and south-facing wraparound porch. I try to keep the new, fresh plants as far away from dry areas filled with pests as I can too, in order to keep them as happy as possible until I put them in the ground in July.

To raise seedlings outdoors in flats in Oklahoma in June and July means you usually have to water them three times a day because those little cells in starter flats dry out fast. I do move them up to 20 oz. plastic cups as soon as possible, but even those dry out fast and need careful attention. Since I am home all day, I can keep an eye on them and water them. If I worked full-time and was gone all day, I'd raise them indoors under lights because that would be better for them than getting too dry while I was away at work all day.

A person who doesn't want to start new seeds for fall has other options for fall tomatoes. You can pay extra special attention to the plants in July and August and try to keep them healthy and pest-free. That may not be enough if the heat is extreme though. You also can take cuttings from existing plants, as long as the plants are healthy and root them. That only takes a couple of weeks at this time of year. You can cut back tomato plants by about 50% in mid-July to late-July, which will encourage them to put out a fresh flush of new vegetative growth. As soon as the temperatures cool down to the right range, hopefully in August but sometimes not until September, they'll start blooming and setting fruit. or, you can buy plants.

Our local stores here all have fresh shipments of heat-setting types in large (I didn't look at them closely, but I'm guessing 5" peat pots) plantable pots in-stock and have had them about 7-10 days. If I wanted to buy new plants for fall planting, I'd buy those big ones right now while they still are healthy. The longer they sit on shelves in garden centers baking in the sun, the more their health will deteriorate over time. Often, this round of plants doesn't last long after they arrive at the stores around Father's Day, and then the stores often won't have fall plants in the stores until the OSU-recommended planting dates for fall tomatoes (July 1-15) have come and gone.

You can grow whatever tomatoes you want for fall. Before I had a greenhouse, I often would grow long-keeping types because you can pick them when they are almost to the breaker stage, wrap each fruit in newspaper, line them up in cardboard boxes in single layers, and they will ripen very slowly indoors over a period of several months, extending your tomato eating season quite a bit. Since I now have the ability to move a few tomato plants into the greenhouse to keep them producing later in fall, I usually don't grow the long keepers any more.

For fall tomatoes, I mostly grow slicers. Long before fall arrives, I already will have canned and dehydrated all the tomatoes I want to preserve, so by fall I am focused just on tomatoes for fresh eating .

If you like to experiment with many varieties of tomatoes, planting a second round of tomatoes for fall production lets you grow more varieties per year.

Some people I know grow their canning tomatoes for a fall harvest instead of a summer harvest because they'd rather be canning tomatoes in fall than in the middle of summer.

Do whatever makes you happy. In OK we get a second chance with almost everything in the fall. The price we pay for that? We have to plant them and get them established in ridiculously hot weather. I was just outside for about 30 minutes, watering container plants and just generally checking on the garden plants, so I wasn't doing anything really strenuous, but it is 97 degrees and I came in here feeling like a wilted flower. Our poor plants cannot come inside, flop down on the couch in an air-conditioned house, drink a tall glass of iced tea, and cool off like we can, so summer is much harder on them than it is on us.

Some years I don't even grow fall tomatoes. One summer (I think it was 2008), I grew fall tomato transplants, but before planting time rolled around it was hot, we were in drought and we were going to summer wildfires quite a lot. Instead of planting the tomato transplants, I just said "it's too hot" and I composted them. In a summer like that, fall tomatoes sometimes require so much irrigation that it isn't worth planting them, so I didn't.

Dawn

Where do I get my seeds? I buy them. Beg for them. "Borrow" them. Trade for them. Save them from last year's best plants.

I haven't stolen any, yet...but don't tempt me.

Got a bunch from Heirloom Organics awhile back, too.

wbonesteel-haha!! And hey, when do you hear about that contest you entered?

Susan and Dawn- thanks so much for the wealth of information! Now I am looking online at seeds that I could have here quickly! Maybe I will give fall tomatoes a whirl. I am learning I more or less garden now to keep my busy, and not so much for the product like I originally intended.

Susan- Would you mind terribly jumping back up a few posts and answering the questions about the seeds?

Dawn- How do I take cuttings from my existing tomatoes to start new ones? Yeah, I know, dumb question, I could just google it.

Bre, I was gonna post something about that contest in a few days. It ends July 31st.

(Some people call me, "Warren." Others call me other things...)

I will try to take some pictures of seed collecting for you. I think I have a few examples out in the garden. I will be happy to collect seeds from my garden for you if you will send me your mail address (from the my page link)

MOS, I don't know where you live in Oklahoma, but if you happen to live in OKC, let me know. I have Black-Eyed Susan that I can dig up for you. They do eventually spread by underground runners, so I would plant them somewhere that they can do that without taking over your other valuable plants.

in addressing the issue of seed collecting, I'm attaching a link with tons of info in regard to this subject generally and for a few specific plants. I do collect seed from a few plants, especially zinnias and morning glories. Old fashioned morning glories will reseed - prolifically - but Japanese Morning glories need to be planted each year. A lot of people collect seeds in the fall, even though the seeds are known to grow next year where they fall, for a few reasons. One, they want to plant them in other locations, or, two, there's a high risk that little critters like birds, mice, bugs, etc. will forage for and eat them during the winter when food is more scarce. Some seeds, like those of tropical plants, may not survive the cold in Oklahoma.

Some common plants that reseed, or self-sow, include:

Cosmos sulphureous, and the Cosmic and Ladybird series hybrids
Salvia coccinea and hybrids, Lady in Red, Coral Nymph, White Nymph, etc.
Poppies
Zinnias ((some)
Larkspur
Hyacinth Bean
4 o'clocks
Marigolds
Cleome*
Sunflowers
Nicotiana aka Flowering Tobacco
Candytuft
Bachelor's Buttons
Golden Crownbeard
Fennel
Dill
Basil
Catnip
Chives
Mullein or Verbascum
Dianthus
Snapdragons
Laura Bush Petunias
Hollyhock (biennial)
Partridge Pea (Senna fasciculata)

*Cleome should only be collected for seeding in the fall, winter sowing, or just allowed to seed in situ. Though it is an annual, it rarely, if at all, will germinate from a spring sowing. It needs the fluctuating winter temps to break dormancy in spring.

There are also perennials that self sow, but I've excluded those for now. There are many more annuals that do as well, but I've tried to list the more commonly grown annuals. I grow many of these. There are many I've listed and those that I haven't that need to be collected in fall for sowing in spring, after the last frost, that do much better either started early indoors or direct sown. Zinnias, for instance, often reseed, but are best collected for sowing when temps get warm in spring.

Hope this helps, and I or others will be happy to answer any questions you have.

Susan

Here is a link that might be useful: Seed Collecting and Saving

Bre,

Here's how I do it:

1. Use a sharp knife to poke drainage holes in 16-oz or 20-oz plastic Solo cups.

2. Stick a piece of duct tape on each cup to use as a label. As I plant, I use an Industrial Sharpie or garden marking pen to put the name of each variety on the tape on each cup as I plant the cuttings. (When I am through with the process of raising cuttings, I pull the tape off each empty cup and toss the tape in the trash. Then I wash the cups and stack them up in my potting shed to be used again for something else.)

3. Fill cups with a good soil-less planting mix. Something like Pro-Mix or Miracle Grow is fine. Moisten soil. This is really important as some mixes come out of the bag really dry at this time of year. Moisten it over and over again if it is really dry until it is good and moist and holds water well.

4. Cut 6" long pieces of existing tomato plants from the ends of branches. Select healthy, pest-free sections to cut. Pinch off any flower buds or blossoms. Pinch off all but the 2 leaves at the top end of the cutting. Stick the cutting down into the planting mix in the cup a couple of inches and firm down the planting mix around the cutting, watering the planting mix to help the soil settle in around the cutting. Be sure to label each cutting as you plant it so you'll know which variety is which.

5. Set your tray of rooted cuttings in the shade in the beginning. I usually keep them in full shade for a few days, and then move them to dappled shade after that. Once the cuttings have been in the cup about a week, I start hardening them off...giving them one hour of full sun the first day, two hours the second day, etc.

6. Always keep the soil moist so the cutting will grow roots, but don't keep it sopping wet or the plants may rot or become diseased.

7. After 10-14 days you'll have plants ready to go into the ground just as soon as you've completed hardening them off to full sun. I usually do the hardening off, adding one more hour daily until they are up to 7 or 8 hours a day and then I put them in the ground.

You also can raise the cuttings in water instead of soil, but if you have cats, dogs or children who might knock over the cups of water causing the cuttings to dry out and die, you might not want to raise them in water. Also, cuttings raised in water have a different sort of root system than those raised in soil, and the ones raised in water sometimes have trouble adjusting when moved to soil, so it is just easier to raise the cuttings in the soil-less mix instead of in water.

It is easy, but I always suggest newbies attempt to root 2 or 3 times as many as they need. That way, if some of the cuttings don't root, there's plenty more.

Once you've done it a couple of times and realize how easy it is, you then can try doing it in the ground. Just take the cutting, stick it in the ground and keep the ground around it moist. Lots of folks will do this when they accidentally break a branch off a plant....they just stick it in the ground and let it root.

Dawn

Warren- Well most people call me Breezy with the expectation of my husband who calls me Breanna, and my parents who call me Fred and Peaches. I will answer to pretty much anything!

Lisa- Pictures would be awesome! I am a eyes on learner. I would love some seeds! I would be happy to pay you for them.

Susan- Thanks! I will have to read that again when I have had a cup of tea and my mind if firing on all cylinders. Its just new to me so it seems foreign!

Dawn- Thank you! That seems easy enough, especially giving that I am going to go in and clean out the bottoms of the plants I have so they get better air.

No need to pay me for them! I am happy to share. Don't forget to send me your snail mail address though! I will need it so I can send the seeds. I should have a few soon and then of course a lot by the end of summer.

Lisa

Bre: I did a poppy seed gathering essay for you! I wasn't too successful getting other photos, I'll have to try again later. My camera is finicky about upclose photos. ...and then I got side tracked taking upclose photos of my hollyhocks :)

If anyone is on FB...I posted an album of my sidetracked-ness. :)
(there were 140 photos...I did manage to cut it down a little!)

Susan- I live east of Tulsa, but thank you for the offer of the Black Eyed Susans! And that link you attached was wonderful, I bookmarked it for the future!

Lisa-Thank you for the seed gathering tutorial! I will send you my address as soon as I finish here! Thank you again!

Has anyone ever ordered from Park Seeds? I don't think I saw it mentioned? I was looking for tomato seeds for fall, and was looking for Bush Early Girl, they don't have Bush, but they have Early Girl, and I was thinking a Park's Whopper, which they have. And then a Roma. And I am going to pull off my Celebrity, and Better Boy, and try to grow those out. I ask about Park Seed's bc I can't find a BEG on any of the sites mentioned.

There is a greenhouse here, its not fantastic, she has far too many plants for what she can handle/sale, and they tend to be root bound, but, if I could find them there, do you think they would do ok?

When a company is not mentioned as a favorite of many people, that's sort of a clue. It used to be really good, I thought, and I used to order a lot from that company. Nowadays, I don't order nearly as much from them as I once did. I am afraid their history of bankruptcy and financial issues seen to have ruined what once was a great company. For what it is worth, I did really like them back before all their troubles developed and I am hoping they will turn things around and become the strong, reliable company they used to be, and that's why I still order a few things from them every year. I'd like to see them get back on track. However, and I need to make this very clear, lately when they ship they are slower than Christmas so I never order any seed now that I expect to grow now. I'll order in spring for fall planting, for example, or order seed in the fall for planting next winter or spring. Other people may have had better experiences with them these last few years than I have.

Bush Early Girl, and about a gazillion other tomato varieties are available from other sources, including the one I linked below....and this particular company has shipped faster than most others in the summer when I have ordered from them at this time of the year.

Plants from the local greenhouse should be fine, unless they have been very rootbound for too long. I try to buy plants early enough after they have hit the shelves that they are fresh and haven't had time to get rootbound yet. Please note: if she is selling plants right now that are leftovers from the recommended planting time for spring tomatoes (April 10-30), I certainly wouldn't buy them. If they have been in the same pots that long, they're too rootbound for you to expect them to do well if planted in July.

If I was in NE OK, I'd look for plants from Duck Creek Farms (check their website, it tells you which farmer's markets or garden shows they're scheduled to sell at this year) or from The Tomatoman's Daughter in Jenks.

I am pickier about summer transplants than spring transplants. Most any tomato plant you buy in spring will adjust to being transplanted and will thrive as long as it isn't sick with a fatal illness when you buy it. In summer, with the extreme heat and all, plants that are not in superb shape at transplant time can struggle. The summer planting conditions are just a lot more challenging than spring planting conditions.

There's also a Rate & Review Vendors forum here at GW. You could go there and see how folks feel about the seed company you mentioned.

Dawn

Here is a link that might be useful: BEG at TGSC

I used to not worry about plants being rootbound as much as I do now. Either after a plant dies or in the fall after a freeze kills all of the plants I pull each plant and inspect the roots. .I write down anything I see especially if it is abnormal. Last year on some of the diseased plants and several plants I yanked after they died due to frost I found several that were rootbound so bad that they never formed a large root system. One large enough to support them and to keep them from being streassed for the lack of water. I have to say some of these were plants I didn't pot up when I should have. The others were a few large plants I bought. The plants that weren't rootbound overall did much better. So I've been very careful this year about not only potting mine up sooner but about the size of the pot in relation to the size of the plant on those I bought. Jay

Thanks Dawn.

Yeah, the local nursery.. its her and her husband, and she had some pink pampas in the container she started them in 3 years ago..so they have been root bound for who knows how long. But, I bought them and planted them on Mothers Day anyways, just to see what I could do. I would assume that given how many plants she has, and how I was the only customer at the time on a Saturday, they don't do much business, and I'd probably have to baby the plants along, or not expect anything from them.

I looked at several pages earlier today looking for BEG, and couldn't find one other then Park's. I should have known you would come right in and be ready and able to give me the website of some! I tried to look up that Duck Creeks, but there is nothing in their schedule.

I have so many tomatoes on the vine right now just toying with me about turning red that I am not sure I need fall plants, but it sounds fun, so why not? And if I can't get plants, or seeds, or nothing grows, well, I had fun trying.

One of the best ways to find seeds of heirloom tomatoes when you want them is to go to Tatiana's Tomato Base. She lists thousands of varieties and always has current seed sources, if known. Each tomato has its own page and there is an alphabetical index to make it easier to find what you're looking for.

For commercial hybrids, there are several companies with a huge selection, including Tomato Growers Supply Company and Totally Tomatoes. Both carry some heirlooms as well. TGSC also carries seeds of peppers, eggplant and tomatillos. Totally Tomatoes is no longer totally tomatoes and has seed for just about everything, but still has a lot of tomato varieties.

With root-bound plants, if I want a plant and cannot find one that is not root-bound, I perform surgery on it when I take it out of the pot and before I plant it. If I pull a plant out of a pot, and the roots just spiral round and round and round in circles, I take a big kitchen knife and cut a big X in the bottom of that root-bound mass of soil and roots. How deeply I cut depends on the size of the mass, but usually 2-4" deep. Then I gently tug the 4 sections a tiny bit away from each other. Then I plant the poor root-bound mess and hope that roots that were cut will grow normally in the ground, instead of continuing the spiraling, girdling, circling they developed while in the pot.

Maybe Gary at Duck Creek Farms isn't selling fall tomato plants this year. Both he and Lisa at Tomatoman's Daughter usually have their fall tomato plants available sometimes in July so it could be he hasn't updated his website yet.

Thanks Dawn! I ended up ordering late last night from Tomato Growers. I ordered a Roma, BEG, and Glacier. I am thinking if I can get it to grow, I will put the BEG in a beautiful pot and she will get to live in the house. I have a lovely window on the west side of the house that gets lots of sunlight. Anyways, I am going to keep my eye on the Tomatoman's Daughter's website and Duck Creek Farms, and see what they end up listing.

I woke up last night and couldn't stop thinking about fall tomatoes, will they grow, where will I put them, etc. I decided that after tossing and turning for an hour over fall plantings, that this silly garden has become my life. Or maybe I shouldn't read OSU's fall planting guide before bed, it puts ideas into my head. :)

I will keep that root bound cutting in mind! Thanks for the tip! With the pink pampas, there were 3 shoots( I guess that's what you would call them) in the pot, so I actually ended up cutting them into separate plants. They seem to have grown a bit. I guess I need to read about them a bit more though bc I have never grown one from this small, and I'm not sure when I should expect it to start blooming.