Morning Glory Odds and Ends Nov 1st, 2008

I hate the way our posts start drying up this time every year. Is there something you want to share, a question perhaps, then here's a place just for you. Maybe you
don't have a pic to send or you don't feel like it warrants a separate thread, then
feel free to post it here.
This summer I discovered
mealy bugs all over my glories on the front porch. First time in my 60 yrs plus that I've ever had mealy bugs on a glory. Hundreds of ant hills in my front and back yards. I think the ant's tote the mealies around. In return, the ants harvest the sticky, honey dew
secretions from the mealies. I finally doused all the seed pods which were covered with mealy bugs with alcohol. Just pushed the sepals down some and poured the alcohol down the sides of the pod. Good bye mealy bugs. lol
Side note: the ants ripen the buds on my Paeony's and Passion flowers and
would you believe on my bush M Glories.

I hope someone will post about something relevant to their mg gardening or
even a response to my comment. I think we could use a thread like this and I've
started one 4 or 5 times, only to erase it w/out sending it. Your comment could help someone. If no one posts, we will just let this
one dry up and blow away with the wind.

Well i have tons of ants running up & down my vines but no mealy bugs thank the lord...i still have blooms if not near as many, some days more than others but thats the norm riiiight? anyhoo, I can't get in my mind how i want to plant the new stuff this next spring, though i need to do a blueprint which i always do to figure out whats going where by what bulb...then i still get surprised...there is always one i forget or a volunteer I miss. Plus, not to get political lol but you never know what the weather will do~ I have had MG vines go an entire year as it never got cold enought for the vine to die back after it stopped flowering, with global warming, who knows how soon spring can show up or long winter will last?
:Darren

Pretty picture Jackie. Well I dislike mealy bugs a lot too and yes I had them on some of my mg's and a few salvia plants.

I have been surprised that I'm still getting a few blooms on my blue star and obscura mg. The obscura has done a lot better for me this year, last year I had it in a hanging basket. I also brought about a dozen mg's inside since it's gotten cooler at night here. I want to get at least a few blooms and see what they are supposed to be. I don't know if I'll get any seed from these but I do have them under a growing light which I think might be too close or too strong. Today I took most of them outside after it warmed up for some fresh air & sunshine. I know this is going to be a pain to keep up but I don't have my makeshift gh set up this year and I think I might loose some of my tropical plants if I don't get my son over to set it up. I've also now am collecting seeds from my salvia plants. I'm lucky that we haven't had a frost yet and the blooms have been lovely to see.
Jackie, I think this is a nice thread you started.

Jackie - Is this the mealybug you are talking about? http://davesgarden.com/guides/bf/go/1553/
I have seen them from time to time in my garden on some of my plants. Didn't know what they were. (I am still a naive newbie gardener.) Haven't seen any on my MGs though, thankfully. But ... I might trade the awful rust fungus for them! LOL! I HATE that nasty fungus!!! With all the rain, the rust is back to attack my MGs again. (sigh)

This message was edited Nov 2, 2008 12:13 AM

Becky, yes that looks like it. Horrible bugs. While I was able to get them off my seedpods, I didn't try to remove them from my foliage. The foliage looked awful
and I decided not to try to carry them thru winter, opting instead to save my seed pods. I don't know if the mealies could get inside the seed pods, but didn't want to risk it.
Darren, I'm sure you're garden will be lovely. A few surprises won't hurt you're
design.
Thanks Helena. Hope your ds gets your g house assembled. Girl, if you're still
getting blooms, send us some pics to the #'d thread. lol

I haven't had a problem with mealies on my MGs yet but have had them on house plants. I was over run with white fly this year for some reason...I think they may have actually been in the bag of dirt I had. Any natural remedies would be appreciated, the less chemical the better....

When I was digging out my dahlias yesterday I forgot about a few vines and saw some fat pods...hopefully the frost and cold haven't damage them and I can get them in today.

OH what I would do for a greenhouse!! LOL

Mealy bugs.. yuk.. so far I havn't seen any of those, I have been harvesting my morning glory curtains, cuttomg them down, wrapping up in blue plastic sheets, and shaking them to get the seeds to break loose. All my Glories have been forzen. So sad.. *sniff* BUT!
I have the original roots and starts I started inside last winter now inside again, and they are leafing and twining quite happily.. now all I need are some GOOD BUGS to bring inside to the basement nursery, so that all the blooming things down here can be pollinated..

I like the idea of using alchohol to be rid of mealy bugs, I have fought white flies extra hard this summer..
wish I had a GH right ouside my back door, like a fellow DG'R I met in my town.. his is set up perfectly!

Becky, ios the color shown in the ophoto of the mealy bugs accurate?? I have what I believe are aphids each spring. If I were to see the pics above but they were green, then I would [possibly] have mealybugs. I still think they are aphids; and yes I think it'd be fun to attach a pic, even one already shown to our posts~keep the spirit alive through the winter! Has anyone ever tried vinegar? It is very acidic, so would it hurt the plant, or do any good against the critters at all? I use Vinegar for like a million things, cleaning, etc...so maybe a garden use for de-bugging the MGs would be a boon. Misting it with alcohol mix maybe? I attached a pic of something called a crossvine that looks nice when near MGs of a dark color (Rebecca, etc.), but it did not bring as mant Hummers as the fountain I have from created from the run-off of my swampA/C units pump. The flowers last about 2 days and are crimson in the thraot to orange at the outside, a nice trumpet shaped bloom that did really well in the heat this summer and I hope it survive the winter!!!!! I love the way it has spread out since I took this picture, very much like an ivy.

whoops, i got the colors reversed when describin the crossvine. I will shut up now. Gold throat with crimson outer rim. sigh. some Mgs and Sweetpeas, which like each other and grow well together.
:D

Darren - Beautiful! Looks like a Crossvine to me! I have one just like it and it has spread along my east fence. http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/1789/ The blooms and leaves on mine look just like yours! You know what my hummers love are the Firespike bush blooms and Cape Honeysuckle bush blooms. http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/1758/ They like those two more than the feeder with sugar water that I have out for them. I grow them all in a corner near my screened in porch in the backyard with the feeder right in there with all those plants.

Here is what I see when I look out my backdoor through my screened porch. The Cape Honeysuckle I am pruning as a standard. It makes a nice small tree and is starting to bloom now. Many of my plants bloom in the Fall/Winter just in time for the migration of the hummingbirds! :-)

Oops! Photo didn't take ... here is another try.

Darren - I don't know about the mealybug colors? I don't see them that often here and didn't know what they were except that they do attack my plants.

I have tried and tried to get sweet peas to grow in my garden to no avail. :-( Love how those intertwine with your MGs! Very pretty.

I threw some Mexican Sunflower (Tithonia rotundifolia) seeds around in my 3-tiered bed in that area and it looks like all the seeds germinated. I have tons of bees and butterflies all over them every day now. Fall is the best season for birds and bugs here in Florida. :-)

Moonflower and LYK x Kohkan vines are what is growing all over my arbor currently. In the two entrance pots are Water Lotus. (Which should be dying down now that the weather has cooled, but instead I see new leaves sprouting. Hmmmm ...)

And this is a photo of one of the Passiflora blooms. This is the vine growing all over most of my east fence, though this one is actually growing on the west fence. I can't see the blooms on the east fence because the vines are so dense.

This message was edited Nov 2, 2008 11:48 AM

Beautiful photo's Becky and Darren. Wish I could grow passion vines Becky. I've got seeds to the hardy one, incarnata, I need to plant next summer. I kill
the tropical ones.
Ronnie, I spent 20 minutes telling you about natural treatments for
whiteflies, then lost my post. 2 great remedies for white flies
The Nicandra plant, a pretty little plant with blue flowers, available from seeds.
First it attracts the whiteflies, then kills then. No wonder, it's in the
deadly night shade family like Brugs and tomatoes. It's called the
shoo-fly plant. Used much in olden times, planted around barns and near the
front and back porches to control the fly population. I've grown it before
for this purpose and it does work. Would have sent you seeds but mine
getting old.
I had whitefly too this summer but they weren't after my glories but the
green bell peppers and Datura Black currant swirl, all sitting in the same tray.
Yellow sticky traps also work. They are attracted to yellow, then they get stuck to
the paper and can't get free. So long whiteflies You can make your own
with yellow construction paper, cut it to size, like 10 inches wide and 3 inches tall. I fold the sheet around a piece of dead wood, twig size, staple it in place
and smear it with peanut butter. That gives me 5 inch's of paper on either side of the twig. I stick the other end of the twig down into the pot. I find as
many as 100 whiteflies stuck to the paper the next am after I place a fresh
trap down in the pot. Last yr I didn't have construction paper so used a yellow
folder like the kids have to take to school each fall. That works great too
smeared with vaseline or p butter.

Jackie - Oh my gosh! Great idea to combat whiteflies! Love it!!! Thanks for those great suggestions! :-) :-)

Beautiful pictures everyone.

Just wanted to say that I've used vinager to kill grass, less toxic to soil and pets.

great shots of bignonia, I have that too.. I had three kinds of honeysuckle out back with the MGs' the cypress vine, . sweet pea, and lonicera.. can't wait to move my passi Ruby Glow out this coming spring, and the firecracker vine and alot others I have acquired.. hummers really liked my cardinal flowers, monarda and four o clocks more than the feeders..:P~

Becky, thanks, both of these methods work.

Helena, the apple cider vinegar is a great health tonic too. It will get rid of
a stomach virus in no time. Use 1 teaspoon of apple cider vinegar to one ounce of cold water. I make up at least 4 ounces at a time. Just sip it till you finish it.
No living on clear liquids for a day or two, instead you
can go back to your regular diet right away. I'm talking a cheeseburger here. lol

hi all...it was brought to my attention that some of the ipomoea leptophylla seeds i have might have megacerus, which is a bug that lays its eggs inside ipomoea seeds..... so i borrowed my nephew's digital microscope today... heres the pic

colin

That may be a scar from caterpillar damage or an exit hole of a seed weevil...seen any beetles cavorting about inside the seed packet?

no beetles gerris... and nothing inside the seed either as i cut it open to find out... it was mostly hollow... three other seeds had small holes in them but no damage inside that i could see... in fact they looked as tho' they would have germinated if i hadn't chopped them up....lol

Wow! Great shot!

I get the beetles off and on. I apologize to everyone if you should happen to get a seed or two from me that has these buggers in it. I try to be very careful when I send seeds, but sometimes they are inside the seeds and you don't even know it until they break the seed open and you see the nasty beetle larvae.

i want to see one becky.... can you find one?
theres none on the seed you sent me :-) or :-( depending on who's got the microscope i suppose....lol

anyway... i did find greenfly :-)))

colin

this pics for danny12.... these are the first roots growing on your ipomoea Betty Mars cuttings... :-)

Colin - Yuck! I think I have a photo somewhere of a beetle larvae on my computer at home. I'll try to remember to find it and post it. It is disgusting looking and eats the seeds from the inside out. So is your photo of greenflies all over your MG? Nasty little bugs!

Very cool photo of a root starting on your Betty Mars. What kind of MG is it? Is it a perennial?

Colin I'm here
Rooting in water - good idea !
Now I try to get roots out a piece of Ricinus or Castor Beans , the mother plant is so big and there are no blooms and no seeds and next week come the first frost.
The idea came when Emma says that she has broken a MG vine but she don't want to lose this piece of vine she says she will put in the soil to root.

a annual plant to root !!! unbelievable

But I try - perhaps it's the Candid Kamera

i've potted them up now dany... and i should try cuttings in water... you never now!... if you change the water every couple of days for water that has stood i usually find it works for a lot of things... bright light no direct sun...

becky... no the greenfly where on the flower stalks on one of next doors potted plant she asked me to save... i saved it by pulling the flowerstalks off (no i didn't give it her back straight away, tho' that would have been funny)... lol

and the cutting is ipomoea indica a perennial...
http://www.hodnik.com/catalog/popup_image.php?pID=1605

Thats a wild shot Colin thanks for posting it. I have never seen anything like that on a seed.
Becky, I have the same HoneySuckle a just planted this year and it grew 4 feet high in one summer!! I think i have just plain old annoying aphids~?thankfullly? ~lol !but now I want to look at all my MG seeds!!! kidding, of course~ I have a Pink MG rambling into the Honeysuckle in this picture... it is out of focus sadly.
My dad used to have a great trick for starting rooting of seeds; take and old piece of fabric like heavy but bit a tight weave and get it soaking wet, & fold over the seeds. leave it somewhere warm NOT hot, for 1-4 days and into the next or ? days depending on seed type, then unfold and blammo! ready to transplant in to pots or garden rows. This works great on top of gas ovens/stovetope unless as most these days they are an electrical starting source. Any consistant warm place works.
I am sure many have done this but reading exchange between Dany12 & Colin made me remember and I thought to post it in case anyone can use it...nevr enough Gardening info!

thanks ferman23 :-) the microscope goes back on friday so i've got all sorts of things under it... tho' worms are not recomended... they're not even slightly compliant!... gardening advice is always welcome..esp. in gardening forums... i always sprout seeds in little plastic tubs(tupperware...ish) that i put in the airing cupboard (strange name for somewhere the hot water tank is kept) or just somewhere out of direct light if the seeds like light to germinate.
with the mg seeds i soaked them over night, stuck them in the tupperware until they sprouted and then potted them up and put the pots in a small propagator untill they all popped out the soil then i took the lid off and put them on the window sil.... i'm hopeing that works... any tips?
oh yes... and i took a honeysuckle out this year 'cos it was always covered with aphids.... which caused sooty mold on the plants below it :-(

Colin, neat use of the water heater, and green too! not using extra electricity but existing energy! lol I love thinking around that stuff...I thought about a radiator...When your young plants are near the window days for the sunlight, make sure to bring them to a warm(est) spot in your place in the evenings, like a radiator, but obviously not too close, or cooked greens! :-O then remmber to get them near the window light again. I like my home cold so I always have to treat my plants that are tropicals (most are) carefully as they like it warmer than me! Watch where the sun hit the floor or a flat surface too, if it is especially cold on any given day we (I) move them to that area away from the sunny window. I use the bathroom alot as it is humid and generally warmer, leftover shower steam/heat...BUMMER about the honeysuckle but tough love for the garden right!>? anyhoo, Never seen a seed with a hole in it like thathttp://davesgarden.com/community/forums/fp.php?pid=5746567 it was truly a very cool thing to see/learn!
:Darren

Darren - Yes! That Cape Honeysuckle seems to grow rather quickly! :-) The Hummers, Bees, and Butterflies love the blooms on mine. It must produce a LOT of nectar! Glad to hear that yours is doing great! :-)

thanks for the tip fernman... i've cleared them a place on the table not far from the radiator :-) they seemed to enjoy it last night anyway... and i got to look at them more :-)

colin

its hard for me to remember everyday to move plants back and forth so I set out things by them that make me go there and jar my sad ol brain cells. Hope it works great for you as it does for me!
:D

thanks for the tips fernman23... car keys are excellent for that sort of thing... i also leave stuff by the dog food.... Mazey never forgets :-)

i planted 9 seeds... one didn't sprout and one died before it fully sprouted.
so i have two sloteri, two coccina, two quamoclit and an unknown one (i planted three unknown ones to find out what they where...) all doing fine :-)

the only difference(apart from species) was that the sloteri and coccinea where really fresh seed and they almost sprouted overnight... the quamoclit where from a packet i purchased a few years ago and the species i got this year.... they sort of did it in slow motion by comparison, even taking longer to fully expand (one quamoclit isn't even fully out now)

does the freshnes make that much difference... or is it just down to species?

Colin - You asked:

"does the freshnes make that much difference... or is it just down to species?"

It can be both...usually very fresh seed will sprout fast,but some species require an intermediate period between the time the seeds are ripe and sprouting...sometimes there may be required an intermediate period of a year or more...these intermediate periods are required to remove certain germination inhibitors that have evolved as survival mechanisms...

I don't recall exactly which species require the extended periods of 'storage' before they will sprout,but the time of germination after the point that a seed falls from the plant may also apply to particular strains and perhaps to a cultivar level...

TTY,...

Ron

thanks ron... there's no straight answers with plants are there!!!!

time as a germination factor.... i suppose you shouldn't throw species seed away if they don't germinate straight away then....

I wouldn't .. I planted some seeds I had from three years ago this summer, they sprouted and took off like crazy.. I also found that some seeds require a "cold" period in order to "wake up" and germinate.. wild and native species require a "cold" period.. about two weeks in the refrigerater will do that. Hope my input has helped a bit.. Debra

thanks debra

Colin - There are many 'straight' answers as per plants and MG's,but sometimes those straight answers are not quite as convenient as gardeners would like them to be...in fact if the germination inhibitor survival mechanisms were all removed from the wild populations,most life on the planet would likely perish due to basic cycles of climatic fluctuations...

The germination page by JLHudson has some interesting basic info here
http://www.jlhudsonseeds.net/Germination.htm

Hope that helps...

Ron

wow what a great link! thanks, Ron ;)