Morning Glories: Becky's MGs Part 5, 1 by beckygardener

beckygardener wrote:
Thanks, Debra, BostonArea, Helena, and Gordon! Yes, Debra, all the hard work has paid off. But I've got much more to do! I eventually want most of the lawn ... gone!

Gordon - I have the vines separated out around the picket fence, though sometimes they do grow together. I can usually unwind them. BUT ... along the taller backyard privacy fence ... well ... that's another story. I have several cultivars growing together and have to use masking tape at each bloom to mark what it is. Takes time in the morning to do that while I rush to get ready for work...

Since I only grow one vine of each cultivar at a time, I don't usually get full coverage along the tall privacy fence. But I could if I planted more seeds. But therein lies the problem ... keeping track of what bloom is what cultivar when hand-pollinating them. And YES! I do hand-pollinate ALL of them! So I don't grow as many as I should to really put on a show.

I don't prune my MG vines unless they get really crazy. The squirrels use the trellis on the privacy fence to come and go from the trees into my yard. It's like a ladder for them. Sometimes on their entrance or exit, they severe a vine. I call that natural pruning! LOL! But mostly I just twine the vines around and through the trellis and neighboring vines.

Because the temperature/climate here is so hot during the summer, the MG vines seem to have a very short life span. They germinate and grow quickly, bloom like crazy with fertilizer, make seeds (usually), and then promptly die. Which is why I can get two (and sometimes three) grow-outs per year! At first I thought it was something I was doing wrong, but gardenpom said the same thing. So I truly believe that the annual MG vines come and go quickly here in the hot south of Florida. Now perennial MG vines or bushes is another situation entirely. They usually do well year round in my area.

Here are my native vine pruners! LOL!

This message was edited Jun 14, 2009 10:41 AM