A Gardeners Forum Forums Gardening Reference Gardening in 2006 Gaillardia question

Now of course, I won't need to worry about this until summer....just can't seem to get my mind off gardening lately!
I grew Gaillardias last summer from seed, they did fine..beautiful flowers, very healthy plant but is there a trick to keeping the flowers from falling over? The foliage only gets to be about 12 inches but the flower stems shoot up to about 30cm and then fall over. I'm not that good with flowers as I have little experience, though, I want to learn more and more!
Any advise?

Thanks, Christina

This is the only thing I could find,
when I was looking for "plant supports"
but it gives you an idea of what I'm talking about.
plant support ideas..

If you put these in the ground, before the plant becomes too tall.. they will grow up and thru the supports and will not flop over as much...

The last one in the list is the one I think you
could use for those types of flowers...

Judt a few ideas: Do you deadhead? And how about cutting them to bring inside when they start to fall over.

Thanx Weezie!! I suppose I could have googled it myself.. I wasn't aware of the plant supports they have available. After looking at the pics, I know what I need to do and I'm sure I could build them myself. Thank-you!!

Sheri..I do deadhead and I do bring them in the house but the plants get so large with so many flowers that I want them to stay outside to add their beautiful colour to my poor excuse of a flower bed. My shastas do the same thing so I think I will use a plant support for those too.

Thanks!!

Christina

The trick to it though
is to get that stuff in early.......
so the plants grow up thru it..
Don't try to do it after the plants are
over grown already...
When they grow up thru it, they will be sturdier.

Your shasta daisys fall over? Are there really tall ones? Mine don't get tall enough to fall over.

Christina,

I've never had a problem with my Shasta Daisies falling over because they stay in compact plants and never get tall enough to fall over. Are you sure they are Shasta Daisies? I have some Crazy Daisies that get taller and they do tend to fall over.

patches1414

Could be the amount of sunshine on them too!!!

Yes, they're shastas. I started them from seed. They get full sunlight all day. I had some at my previous home as well..they also fell over from getting to tall.

Then the next one would be,
Do you use any fertilizers???

I have 3 different types of Shastas, and one of them gets over 3 ft. tall and tends to fall over as well. I usually try to just support the individual stems that lean since not all of them do...mostly the outer stems. My other 2 Shastas don't get quite tall enough and the stems are very sturdy.

I have two kinds of daisy's..
A bunch of wild ones'......
and one multi~package of seeds, that
got the "I'm assuming" Shasta...

The one's that came from the package,
are sturdier that alllllllllll get out....
And they grow in part shade until about 1:00pm,
until 5:00pm.. They are sturdy and staight,
but I do absolutely nothing to them and they are in plain backyard dirt, and nothing else..

The weedier one's are weeds, and skinny and they stand up, but are not at all like the fat stemmed seed~package kind...

But that's why I asked about the fertilizers, usually too much makes them too much green growth..
or the shade, looking or stretching for the sun...

They may have been mis~marked in the package...
Might be an option...
Like I said, I never bought any, but the one variety that I got in the seed package, I assumed was a Shasta variety, because of the stems... and being sooooo much sturdier than the weed ones..

Boy, Christina, I'll bet those tall daisies make beautiful cut flowers. If you ever find any more seeds I'd be more than excited to take some off your hands. I like bringing flowers indoors or taking them to work.

I don't know much about flowers but if I know anything, it's shastas! Daisies are my favourite flower...my daddy calls me "DaisyMaeSunshine"...I even have a tatoo of a daisy on my right arm. I know they're shastas!
Here's a pic of them to show you. This was taken early in the season when I noticed the first bud...I was so excited to see it. Unfortunately, I don't have any pics when it was large and falling over..but it happens...trust me. I have several shastas spread throughout my yard...it happens to all of them.

They do look like the fat stemmed one's I have..

I'm stickin' with the kind of dirt/or fertilizer??

(I Love daisy's too)

Do you get in to any of the coneflowers, black~eyed~susan's, etc... types too??

The only fertilizer I've ever used is All Purpose Miracle Grow. I can't stress enough how little I know about flowers. All I know is I love daisies and sunflowers. I'm tellin' ya...my house might as well be shaped as a daisy! My bathroom is daisies..I have towels, sheets, pictures, pens, pencils, notepads, absolutely anything and everything that hasta' do with daisies..and underwear .
Weezie...I love black eyed susans!! I'm going to grow some this year. I just bought this house last April and I had very little time to do much...will get to it this year!!!

They have the neatest colors now in the
Purple coneflowers, like orange and yellow..
and white
soooooo pretty..

And then there's the Black~eyed~Susan's,
Irish~eyes *green centers instead of the dark brown* sooooooo many different varieties,
but on the same scale/theme of a daisy...

And the SUNFLOWERS, don't get me started on the sunflowers.. I had so many different one's,
and the deer gave just about every plant a hair cut...


For me, I wouldn't put anything on them that says, MIRACLE GROW... that stuff is mostly for green growth, and it can make stuff grow too fast, it can make stuff spindly...

Especially, and again this is only my opinion,
but a plant that normally would be found in the wild so to speak, has a tendancy to be able to take care of it's self..without much additives..

It gets full sun, right???

ChristinaC, You are not alone. Mine fall over also. I do not deadhead or bring flowers inside. It could be our weather conditions. I know after a rain shower they are really laying on the ground.