How To Grow Phacelia Tanacetifolia
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- Опубликовано: 6 апр 2023
- Growing A Cut Flower Garden in Scotland, zone 8b
Phacelia tanacetifolia also known as fiddleneck or scorpion flower is a brilliant cut flower and also a green manure. It is very successful as a cut flower here in our Scottish climate as it is a hardy, cool annual that tolerates a little cold and flowers quickly from seed sowing. I have been growing it for the last 9 years and in this video share all I have learned from sowing the seeds to harvesting it and using in flower arrangements.
What is covered in this video?
Why grow phacelia?
Sowing seeds
Planting in the garden
Garden care
Harvesting
Flower arranging with phacelia.
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Gorgeous Catherine. Thank you.
Thanks Susan 😊 I hope you are having a lovely Easter weekend x
Thanks, Catherine. 😊
Thanks Cindy for watching this week. Have a nice Easter weekend.
Thank you Catherine for all the useful information, Really enjoying these videos. Happy Easter. x
Happy Easter to you too Gina, it was lovely to see some sunshine today and hope it continues over the weekend. I am really glad you are enjoying the videos x
Thank you for all of the amazing tips & ideas! I truly appreciate it! 💙
Thanks so much for watching. I am glad you found it helpful 😊
Thorough and helpful as always! Thank you!
Thanks Jeanne, have a lovely Easter weekend.
You too. Happy Easter!
You’ve peaked my interest to try Phacelia now! I have started cerinthe, and they are the sweetest seedling with their fawn-like spots.
Really great video 😊
Thank you so much 😊
Thanks so much. I will be trying these for sure. As I had commented before the pkg I had purchased was empty lol. Got my money back but after seeing them, I will try them.
Your bouquets are stunning 💕
Hi Vera, you will have to let us know how you get on growing them. I am really glad you are enjoying seeing the bouquets and jar arrangements. I love this time of year when you can start putting some together again for people after the winter.
Such a thorough and informative video, thank you! I have been learning about green manures, and we passed a farmers field full of sunflowers, vetch, buckwheat, crimson clover and this gorgeous flower, phacelia! I was so excited, had to go and take pictures and try to figure out the different flowers! That was a few weeks ago. We drove past it again yesterday, and it's further along. Some things going to seed others just coming, it was really great. I'm definitly going to buy this phacelia for flowers and green manure. I didnt realise, until I read your comments, that it would self seed over winter, so I'll be careful in the veg garden to cut before it goes to seed. Ps this wasnear Hawick, Scottish Borders.
Hi, thanks for watching 😊 I have never seen it grown locally in the fields as a green manure so that’s interesting you saw it near Hawick. It really is a great plant. I love that it offers so much from being a great green manure, excellent for bees and a fantatstic cut flower plus super easy to grow!
Thanks so much for all your hard work presenting these fab information clips
So comprehensive
About to start our first flower farm 28:15 year
Feels like you’re holding my hand
Best wishes and happy growing from a very windy mountainside in County Waterford Ireland
Sharon x
Hi Sharon, thanks so much for watching 😊 and good luck for this year. It’s such an exciting time and a huge learning curve! I am really glad you are enjoying the videos, next weeks one is going to be about the direct sowing I do. I hope you are having a lovely Easter weekend x
Thanks so much for the detailed information. I have never seen these grown in California and really would appreciate any advice on where to acquire seed. Seeing your incredible bouquets is not only inspiring, it is amazingly calming and mood elevating.
Hello Susan, thank you so much. I am glad you are enjoying seeing the flowers in the videos. I think you can now get phacelia seeds from Johnnys seeds in the USA. I hope you can get some to try growing them in California x
Susan, phacelia is native California plant growing in Santa Monica mountains all over now. I live in Newbury Park and collect them in surrounding mountains and hills.
@@sagebees8511 Thanks so much for the information. Living in the Northern California foothills we have mostly poppies, lupine, monkey flower and Indian paintbrush. Seems like phacelia would grow well here and I am looking for a summer cover crop.
I bought seeds from Johnny’s (Maine, US).
Love your flower arraignments!
If cut back will the phacelia rebloom? If not, how often should it be succession sown? Growing it for the first time this year.
Thanks Naomi thanks 😊 Yes it is a cut and come again flower although I find the best stems are the first ones and re blooms are often shorter. I find it easiest to do one sowing in autumn for late May flowers. A March sowing for June/early July flowers, one in April for July/August and one in May to Keep some flowers going into September for me x
Thank you for your reply! Very thorough! I had started sowing some before seeing this video but will wait and succession sow the rest!
Hello only heard of this plenty recently I usually throw lots of wildflower seeds especially borage for bee's... Can I direct sow this now I'm in Yorkshire.... Thank you for your help...
Hello, thanks so much for watching. Yes you can direct sow it just now as it is quick to germinate and it does have a shorter germination to flowering time than other seeds so will bloom well for you before the end of the growing season.
Awesome thank you ordered a pack it'll be here today.... I have various spaces where I am growing wildflowers... For the bee's... This will be a fantastic addition... Thank you for your help very much appreciated...
I don’t have a greenhouse unfortunately. I live in the city and my garden is quite small. What’s the coldest temperature that Phacelia can survive outside ?
Some of my Phacelia have just started to bloom the purple on top and others are big and almost at that point, but not quite yet.
I would say outside down to about minus 5c with some frost cloth over as protection if temperatures were getting below freezing. It’s more the conditions in your garden too. For example waterlogged or very wet soil with poor drainage over the winter is more damaging sometimes than the cold.
I planted my Lacy Phacelia seeds one week ago and I didn’t put any seed compost on it. Should I put seed compost down the next time I plant any seeds ? Also, Home Depot has “Potting Mix”, can Potting Mix be used for seeds in a garden ? Or is Potting Mix only for pots ?
I’m almost forgot to mention that I also put down “Top Soil” before I planted the seeds.
Hello and thanks for watching 😊 Phacelia are quite robust little seeds which germinate easily outside so the soil type shouldn’t matter too much. As long as the potting mix doesn’t have large chunks in it that the seeds wouldn’t be able to germinate through it should be ok. If it’s very lumpy you can always sieve it to get a finer consistency for seed sowing.
@@cloudberryflowers-flowerfarm large chumps, so should I stay away from mulch ?
Are the Phacelia in this video annuals or perennials ?
The Phacelia I have are annuals.
Hello, the phacelia in the video are annuals. Thanks for watching.
@@cloudberryflowers-flowerfarm are there any Phacelia that are perennials ?
And do the plants start to die in the winter or late fall ?
Can’t I just plant the seeds in my garden ? Do I have to plant them in a pot first ?
Thanks for watching. No you don’t have to plant them in a pot first. They can be direct sown in the garden especially when the soil has warmed up now. I tend to just start some in pots in early spring when it is too cold to germinate seed outside and it gives me a slightly earlier crop but after that I would direct sow outside.
I wonder if it will grow in the heat… I have seeds but it’s going to get hot here in Ohio soon. If I sow in my cool basement and harden off, can I expect them to survive the heat?
Thanks so much for watching. Phacelia is actually great because not only is it cool tolerant which works for me. It is also heat tolerant and originated from the south west US and northern Mexico. It can survive periods of drought better than other annuals and can grow well in sandy soils in the sunshine.
How do you properly store Phacelia seeds that are leftover so you can save them for next year ?
I have a metal tin with lid that I store my seeds in. It stays in a dry cupboard in the house until I need them to sow again. Any seed I have collected myself I make sure is completely dry before storage and I put them in a paper bag labelled and that goes into my tin box too.
I have seen some recommendations to presoakor scarify the seeds prior to sowing, but it seems you have found that unnecessary?
Hello, thanks for watching. That is interesting. I haven’t heard of that before. For me I have never had to do this and always had good germination, very quickly too compared to some other seeds.
@@cloudberryflowers-flowerfarm thank you! I am excited to try growing it.
@@cloudberryflowers-flowerfarm I ended up sowing the seed both ways, presoaked and not and both ways worked fine.
Sorry for asking so many questions, but is it possible to save your Phacelia by replanting them in a pot and putting them inside of your house for the winter and replant them back in the garden once June comes again ? Or are they going to die no matter what ? I have the annual Phacelia.
Lots of questions are great! For the phacelia if it has already flowered then no it won’t flower again next year so no point digging it up and overwintering it. But if you have sown phacelia fairly recently and it has only put on some leafy growth and not going to flower before the end of the season then yes you can either overwinter in the ground where it is or pot it up. Any of my overwintered phacelia have done best outside in the ground as mine have got quite leggy in the greenhouse.
If it self seeds, would you have it blooming few times a year?
Yes you could have it self seeding throughout the season if you left each succession to go to seed and some of those may give you flowers a few times a year. Because I cut all the stems from mine for flower arranging the only time the flowers are left to go to seed is the end of the season for me. So I only get flowers from self seeding in the spring from those autumn ones that have dropped, germinated and then overwintered.
So i planted last week an acre of Phacelia, and today there was frost -1 (for 2 hours) it killed many plants in my garden. Do you think that the phacelia will survive and come out ?
Oh no I am sorry that the late spring frosts have killed some of your plants in the garden. For me phacelia does well at lower temperatures. It was -3 here this week and my phacelia seedlings are looking good still. I hope your phacelia is still looking good this week.
Is it mandatory to separate each plant a few feet from each other ? Or can they stay close together and thrive ?
Hello and thanks for watching. I find phacelia can grow to be quite bushy especially if autumn sown so that is why I space them like that. Having said that when growing for cut flowers sometimes if you space flowers closer together it encourages the stems to grow taller and more upright so I think you could space them a little closer.
@@cloudberryflowers-flowerfarm I’ve noticed that the Phacelia that are growing closer together in my garden are actually growing a lot faster than the ones that are by themselves. So it makes sense when you said they’ll grow taller when they’re closer together.
How often should I water my baby Phacelia plants ? They’re about two inches tall now.
Hello, it depends whether your baby phacelia plants are inside or planted out in the garden. If they are in a greenhouse I would be checking the plants everyday and watering if the soil is dry. Outside I would be checking a couple of times a week and watering. However at the moment here we have had rain everyday for the last few weeks so no watering has been needed and then in May it was dry everyday so I needed to water the beds everyday. It really does just depend on the conditions where you are. The main thing is to keep them growing in moist but not waterlogged soil and not let them dry out.
@@cloudberryflowers-flowerfarm oh ok, I was letting the soil dry up outside before I watered them again.
Is it possible to kill weeds without killing the Phacelia ?
I am not sure it would be. Do you mean kill the weeds with weed killer?
@@cloudberryflowers-flowerfarm yes.
I think you would lose the phacelia too if using weed killer close by to it.
@@cloudberryflowers-flowerfarm is the best time to use weed killer in the winter when all of the plants have died ?
Will that prevent the weeds from growing back in the spring ?
I made the horrible mistake of touching mine and I got the worst rashes ever 😆
Oh no that’s unlucky. I’ve heard some people can react with a rash to some species of phacelia but have never had that happen myself. Sometimes wearing gloves when cutting flowers helps but it’s not always easy to remember to do that.