Looking for hollyhocks

I would love to get my hands on some heirloom hollyhock seeds. Does anybody have any for sale? Thanks!

I just found my seeds (the joys of a protracted cross-country move!), both the "niger" (black) and some random old bright colors from hollyhocks that did well in the desert, but whether any are still good ... I don't know. Am trying to grow some of the niger right now and so far only one has come up. Not sure they're anything special (niger is widely available), tho once I get a bloom season I'll start saving seed.

My seed is about 13 years old so will be a bloody wonder if more than a handful come up.

When you store hollyhock seeds, bug-spray them good (pyrethrin horse spray works well; I use Repel-X) and seal them up. Otherwise chances are they'll all be eaten away by tiny worms.

Planted some other saved seed too, from about 2006... I had the bachelor buttons seed sorted by color, and funny thing, the lavender ones came up better than the fresh seed I just bought. None of the rest, other than a couple of "mixed colors" have come up yet, but it's only about 62 degrees where they are so they may be slow.

I have some you can have. I have pink, white and dark red in my HH grove., but I can only find the seeds that I harvested from my pink flowers at the moment. I'm at 8000 ft in Colorado so we have a short growing season and my HHs mange to bloom and grow to a height of just over 6 feet. I do cloche them in the spring. I cut the bottoms out of those big glass 1 gallon wine jugs and cover in the early spring. It lengthens their growing season and protects them from the deer. Not sure if they will come up pink since they are in a grove of mixed colors but you can have as many as you want.

Andrew Sul wrote:I have some you can have. I have pink, white and dark red in my HH grove., but I can only find the seeds that I harvested from my pink flowers at the moment.

Anyone know if they normally breed true, or if bees randomly mix then around? Anyway please keep me in mind for the fall seed harvest!

Andrew Sul wrote:I'm at 8000 ft in Colorado so we have a short growing season and my HHs mange to bloom and grow to a height of just over 6 feet. I do cloche them in the spring. I cut the bottoms out of those big glass 1 gallon wine jugs and cover in the early spring. It lengthens their growing season and protects them from the deer.

That's a good idea.

Discovered a little trick for getting better germination from tired old hollyhock seeds:

Split away the outer covering before planting it. Inside is a little brown bean, the actual seed.

Instead of 1 in 5 and very slow to come up, my naked seeds are 2 for 3 and the first one germinated in just 3 days.

ETA: The seeds still in their wrappers are now 2 for 5 at two weeks. The naked seeds (I lied, apparently I planted 4) are 3 up and 1 rooted after 5 days.

I had to clip the seed covering off some of the old gazanias too, they came up but it just wasn't coming off. I'm thinking that when these seed coverings get old, some get tough and the seeding can't break out. I know some people clip iris seeds to make it easier for them.

Hollyhocks are a weed here in France often found in citys growing between gaps in the pavement

David Livingston wrote:Hollyhocks are a weed here in France often found in citys growing between gaps in the pavement

True hollyhocks, or hollyhock mallow? the latter is now sometimes being sold here as a "hollyhock", and it's not what we expect!

Of course any plant is a weed if it's where you don't want it...

Well they grow 6th tall so I put them down as not mallow

David

David Livingston wrote:Well they grow 6th tall so I put them down as not mallow

David

Nope, that wouldn't be mallow!

Rez Zircon wrote:

Andrew Sul wrote:I have some you can have. I have pink, white and dark red in my HH grove., but I can only find the seeds that I harvested from my pink flowers at the moment.

Anyone know if they normally breed true, or if bees randomly mix then around? Anyway please keep me in mind for the fall seed harvest!

Andrew Sul wrote:I'm at 8000 ft in Colorado so we have a short growing season and my HHs mange to bloom and grow to a height of just over 6 feet. I do cloche them in the spring. I cut the bottoms out of those big glass 1 gallon wine jugs and cover in the early spring. It lengthens their growing season and protects them from the deer.

That's a good idea.

I have a bunch of seeds from last fall if you want some. Let me know, I'm going by the post office tomorrow afternoon. It's been awhile since I studied Mendel's peas so I'm not sure what colors you'll get but you are welcome to what I have. I got blooms the first year when I planted and I'm told they'll grow to 8 feet down in Denver where the growing season is longer.

Andrew Sul wrote:I have a bunch of seeds from last fall if you want some. Let me know, I'm going by the post office tomorrow afternoon. It's been awhile since I studied Mendel's peas so I'm not sure what colors you'll get but you are welcome to what I have. I got blooms the first year when I planted and I'm told they'll grow to 8 feet down in Denver where the growing season is longer.

Thanks! Sent a PM. Our weather is similar enough that what's adapted there should be pretty good here. At that altitude they're probably a bit short on CO2, which would stunt 'em a bit.

Hollyhocks we had in Great Falls in the 1960s got HUGE (8 to 10 feet and bloomed like crazy) with zero care, and there the weather is more extreme yet. So I guess that doesn't bother them much!

PM received. I'll get them in the post this afternoon.

Thank you!

Andrew Sul wrote:PM received. I'll get them in the post this afternoon.

They've arrived! Those are nice fat healthy seeds.

I had six of the ancient nigra seeds come up, so hopefully they'll eventually produce some seeds! I'll save your address in my seed box. Thanks again!

You're welcome. You should get good germination rates from them since they are fresh. The only problems I had were the wind and the deer. The plants themselves are pretty hardy. Enjoy.