The seeds of change

I have been manically sowing seeds for a few weeks. I may have started too early, and end up with a huge log jam of plants waiting to go out when it's still too cold. I have a number of temporary cloches at the ready, should the need arise.

I mostly grow interesting annuals that I can use to plug gaps in the garden - last year Tagetes 'Cinnabar' (a tall marigold with beautiful rust-orange flowers) was a great discovery. It worked well in both sun and partial shade, flowered like mad and required no dead heading, and the foliage is beautful too - finely cut, frondy leaves. Cleome 'Violet Queen' was great (I discovered it's best grown from fresh seed, for a good germination rate) and at the front of the border Panicum 'Frosted Explosion' filled in gaps and gave a beatiful airy backdrop to any flower colour. In pots, I loved Silene coeli-rosa 'Blue Angel'.

This year I'm trying some more new things - including Cosmos 'Picotee' and Cosmos 'Antiquity', Trachelium 'Pandora' (no germination yet...), Didiscus caeruleus. and Setaria macrostachya 'Will Scarlet' (another grass). The joy of annuals is that they flower their socks off all summer, and if you don't like something, you're not stuck with it - just don't grow it again next year! I'm also going to do some late sowings - I did this accidentally last year, and it was really useful to have some fresh things to plug the gaps as the garden started to look a little jaded in August.