My Holly Hocks came up! A lot of beautiful shades of pink! And I got a coral and white with yellow! When I seen my first Hollyhocks I just looked up in the sky. and Thank you!
Diane Beckett, Wow, you made me cry! Thanks for writing. Sometimes we get such negative comments, it's wonderful to hear from a viewer like you. Best to you, Dirt Farmer Maggie
Love these. Hadn't seen them until I moved to New Mexico. They come in many colors and variations. Greatest outdoor flowering plant. Take minimal care, and come back after winter freezing.
Hi John. Thanks for sharing that memory. We have some that can be seen from the breakfast table as well. Do you still garden? Looking forward to more of your comments on our other videos. Best to you and your family for a wonderful holiday season. DFM
@@DirtFarmerJay That was in my grandpa's organic raspberry farm up near Canada. I'm deep in urbania now so my gardening is very very limited now but I have a Freedom cultivar apple tree, some concord grapes, bohemian horseradish, rhubarb, peonies, mums, tulips and whatever herbs I can tuck away between plants. I love growing basil in the hallway because its so good on pizza.
I have tons of hollyhocks. Sone have reached the height of the carport. The bases of the current ones are over 30 inches wide. I am trying black hollyhocks from seeds. They can be transplanted really well. Love these flowers.
@@Dezertroze43 They look a little droopy at first, but I made sure to keep them well watered until they come out of their transplant shock. That seemed to help a lot.
I bought this house last December - I’ve been babying a few of these all spring, thinking they were some kind of squash plant. Three days ago, all of a sudden I have the most gorgeous baby pink, double ruffle blossoms on one and white on another. Plus I have dozens of babies sprouting up all over my beds. Ha! My sister just enlightened me! Hollyhocks! I couldn’t fire up RU-vid fast enough. Thanks so much - you answered all of my questions, and I’m really looking forward to seeing what other colors I get. Very excited. But that pink one - so elegant, so delicate looking. I’m in love!
Tootsla, thanks for writing and telling us about your very pleasant surprise of finding that you have hollyhocks in your yardscape. It's easy to add diversity as well by asking for seeds from others that are growing other colors and types. You will find that they will naturalize (lots of seeds dropped yearly, with plenty of germination the following early spring) readily, with the need to reduce their numbers in some areas. Keep them managed and they will add a lot of color and backdrop height to your setting. Enjoy! DirtFarmerMaggie
Beautiful beds! I let my hollyhocks self seed last fall and am so excited to see how many come back this year! I may add a few new colors. Really hoping they bring in the pollinators for my berries.
Thanks for the video. After a lot of research, I found out that I have hollyhocks growing in my circle garden. I remembered that there were a few last year from a mix seed box from Menards. This year I have so many plants!!!! SO MANY!! I'm excited to see what colors I have. They are growing very tall! The video was perfect for the informaiton I needed.
So nice of you to take time to leave a comment!! I love to hear from our viewers. You can harvest the seed pods from the top of the plants at the end of the season, collecting the colors you like best and them sow them into your various garden plots in the early spring. Happy gardening to you! DFM
Hi, Dear Maggie Remember me from last year when I told you I was starting Hollyhocks , well they did bloom , and they were beautiful, but I left the seeds fall, and I think this year , I’m going to have a massive amount! I’m not complaining, they are a beautiful flower! 😄! Have a great day!
Good for you Diane. I let the seeds fall and naturalize in most areas every season and we always have lots of color in the garden beds as well as lots of pollinators. Best to you Diane and thanks for writing! Dirt Farmer Maggie
Thanks Diane Beckett for watching and commenting. Hollyhocks are very prolific and will spread by dropping their seed pods once they get dry. You can collect the dried seed pods before they drop and put them in an envelope writing what color bloom that plant produced. Then you can seed them the following year in the spring or the current year in the fall. Just cover them with about one inch of soil and water in. You'll have hollyhocks coming out of your ears in a year or two. They are a huge (and beautiful) part of our landscape. Best to you, Dirt Farmer Maggie
Thank you for replying! It is a beautiful flower! I am starting them this year! Patience is a virtue ! Can, not wait to see them Bud! 🙂💐xo Diane Beckett Pennsylvania .
I thought the double flowered ones are hard for the bees and butterflies to pollinate? Just something I've heard. So, I just stick with the single layered flowers.
i am trying to grow American seeds in Thailand where it is very hot and wet. Some Pennsylvania Hollyhock seeds germinated and came up out of the dirt in two days. If I can keep the bugs away, I hope to see some flowers this year. The bugs have devoured everything else I tried. Go Hollyhocks!
I love mine. They just Sprang up! A few years ago. And have grown every year since. Multi flowers on their stems. It's now mid November in England and have been blooming since August. Unlike sadly most flowers where you're lucky if they flower for more than a month.
I agree with you skinkicker 123. They are hardy plants that bloom year after year. They will drop seeds in the Fall and give you even more plants in the Spring. Our landscape is full of these beautiful blooms. Best to you, Dirt Farmer Maggie
I must tell you! I got my first Hollyhock that I have grown in my garden that I have germinated! I got a little emotional !😢🙂 but I used the Neem oil and homemade funguside!
Thanks Yanina Magali. We have SO MANY Hollyhocks around our farm it's ridiculous. But I can't see planting other flowers when these will self seed in the spring and are very hardy in almost any weather. Best to you, Dirt Farmer Maggie
You're welcome Stephen. Once you try some Hollyhocks in your beds, I'll bet they will become a "go to" plant in your garden for years to come. Thanks for watching! Best to you. DFM.
That is the tall plant with large leaves. Didn't plant it so the birds must have left me a gift. When it goes to seed I can have several in my flower gardens. Thank you.
Hi Barbara Carroll. Yes! Hollyhocks are one of the easiest flowers to propagate around your place because if the wind doesn't carry the seed pods to other places, the birds that eat the seeds then poop them out will! If you want to control the color scheme, you can make notes of what color flowers each plant put on this year, then when the seed pods dry out, collect them, label them in envelopes and cast the seeds, where you want that color, in the early spring. Best to you, Dirt Farmer Maggie
Hi Maggie, thank you for the video. A really nice lady pulled up 3 hollyhocks from her garden and gave them to me. I transplanted them on my flower bed last summer. With the cool weather and watering they are so beautiful and green and seem to be thriving, they are spreading out, my question is, Do I need to trellis them so that I can get a stalk with beautiful flowers or do they not need help. I live in Southern California, I think zone 10. I love gardening, I’m new at it, so I really appreciate your time, take care🌸
Hi Dena! Thanks for watching and writing. Some people trellis them if they are planted in a formal grouping. I tend to let them naturalize. (I find it easier to take out what I DON'T want than add in extra.) When they get really large, you can stake them, but they have a pretty strong stem. One thing to remember is that they will drop a TON of seeds once they are spent so if you don't want a Hollyhock forest, thin them out when they are medium sized. Let me know how it goes. Thanks again! DFM
@@DirtFarmerJay Thank you for your time in replying. When you say you let them “naturalize” does that mean simply to leave them alone? Sorry for silly question. Thank you for your advice. 🌸
Thank you for sharing your hollyhocks garden. They are beautiful! I wonder if you can show us your maintenance routine against hollyhock weevil and sawflies. My hollyhock leaves are starting to look like a sieve.
Thanks for watching and commenting Rozanna Mroz. The leaves on my plants are always stripped by the sawflies. But the blooms are so beautiful and dependable, I can look past the ugly leaves. Best to you! Dirt Farmer Maggie
How exciting David Barnes. Let me know how it goes. We have so many Hollyhocks that I just let them reseed themselves in the beds and then either leave them there or when they sprout I remove the new plants and transplant to another bed. Happy gardening my friend! Best, Dirt Farmer Maggie
Have always wanted hollyhocks because my grandma had them. I don't know if I mistook them as weeds in the spring, but I have had no luck. I will try again. Thanks.
Thanks for watching and commenting Alejandro Alcala. Our Hollyhocks are all getting ready to bloom! I LOVE this time of year!! Best to you, Dirt Farmer Maggie.
Hi Valerie. You can cut them down pretty low. Keep in mind, as I mentioned in the video, you are likely to get a second round of blooms in the late summer/early fall, if you snip off the tops that have died and leave some green leaves at the bottom. Keep watering until it's too cold. Best. DFM
Enjoyed your video. I am a newbie with hollyhocks, living in Belleville Ontario. Planted seeds in spring, plants R growing, some over 5 foot tall already June 17, 2021 can I expect flowers this year, and what do I do in the fall. any advice appreciated.
Thanks for watching and commenting Neil. Here's a few tips: 1. Hollyhocks will get pretty sad looking towards the hot part of summer - just so you don't think yours are dying. They are just trying to stay alive. 2. Their leaves will get holes in them and look bad when it's the hottest. 3. If you love a certain color of flower that yours has, harvest the seed pods in the fall, dry them and put them in an envelope with the color written on it. Then you can cast those seeds in other spots in the spring to get more plants with that color you like. 4. Hollyhocks will come back season after season. Their seeds are really light weight and can travel in the breeze or be eaten by a bird and pooped out in another spot. My point is, once you have them, you will ALWAYS have them. They are dependable and beautiful. Some will grow to 5 or 6 feet tall. Have fun! Best, Dirt Farmer Maggie
Good question Diane. I don't cut them down. I let them re-seed where they are or let the seeds fly to new areas or get brought by birds who have eaten them and deposited them elsewhere. If you want to plant a certain color in a certain area, you can collect the seed pods in the Fall for sowing in the Spring. But I just leave them alone and let them naturalize. Thanks for asking and watching. Best to you, Dirt Farmer Maggie
HI thanks for sharing your garden with us. My question is how long do the buds take to flower ?? It seems that my have been there about a week the plant looks real healthy, with lots of buds, but they just don't seem to want to open up ??
Laura, if they haven't already, they will start opening very soon. I think you'll find that they don't all open at the same time, even on the same stalk. So you get a very nice display over several weeks. When the blooms are spent, you have a choice of either letting them fall and reseed, or removing the blooms and or stalks to tidy up the bed and reduce the amount of plants the following season. Thanks for watching and writing! Best, DFM
Hi Big Beef89! Hollyhocks are VERY HARDY plants that self propagate when their spent seed pod drop in the fall. (You can gather and dry the seeds - keeping track of what color the bloom was from each plant, then sow them the next spring.) They grow well in most soil - even heavy clay soil. They are almost impossible to kill, actually. You will be very pleased with them!
I have seed from my grandparent's yard. Its June 19th and I want to just put the seeds in the ground. Do you think they will grow? I'm in Kansas 6a zone. Thanks!
Becky, most likely some of them will start up but most of the seeds need to stratify over the winter and then reset in the spring. Hollyhocks are biennial so it takes a two-year lifecycle but they prolifically reseed so it appears that they are always growing when it's just lots of different plants. Give it a shot, I think you'll be pleased with the results. You can't lose by going ahead and putting them in the ground even if they wait until spring to germinate. Thanks for watching and writing! Best, dfj
As the season wears on, our Hollyhocks look pretty sad. The leaves are full of holes and stems are yellow. This happens every year. It's part of their life cycle I think because it's always been this way. However Hollyhocks will always be a staple in our landscape. They are dependable and beautiful. Best to you, Dirt Farmer Maggie.
Hi Jim. I don't know anything about them being edible. You can check with your local extension service or look on line. Thanks for watching and commenting. Best, DFM
Congrats on growing hollyhocks. Here's some info for you from the internet. Rust and leaf spots are a couple of fungi that attack hollyhocks. Leaf spots start as small gray spots on the leaves of the plant. The disease eats away at the leaf and produces a hole as the infested area falls from the foliage. Rust is a common problem with hollyhocks and can cause the plants to look ragged. Brown, yellow, or orange spots appear as the fungus forms and grows. The damaged leaves will fall off as the disease progresses. Preemptive Measures: Minimize the common problems that occur when growing hollyhocks with a few precautionary steps. For example, the rust fungus attacks all members of the hollyhock family, including weeds; the fewer weeds that grow in the garden, the fewer hosts the fungus can attack. The fungi and pests live in the dead leaves and debris in the flower bed; remove any fallen leaves and other debris throughout the growing season to keep disease and pests to a minimum. Water at the base of the flowers instead of overhead to keep the foliage dry; wet foliage is a breeding ground for fungus. Remove any insects or infested leaves as soon as possible to keep your hollyhocks healthy throughout the growing season. Hope this helps! Dirt Farmer Maggie Johanne Champagne Johanne Champagne • 1 day ago
Thanks for watching and commenting Diane Beckett. Yes, they are gorgeous at the beginning of the season but by the end they look pretty sad. The thing I love about hollyhocks is their dependability to come back year after year and fill my flower beds with lots of color. Best to you, Dirt Farmer Maggie
Shelly, most of our beds are quite sizable, so we use Rainbird rotary sprinklers on high risers (about 3 to 4' tall) to water. We do this either at night or times when it is not windy or mid-day so as to minimize evaporation and get more water into the soil. If we used drip, it would be quite extensive, and prone to damage as we weed the beds and add new plantings. I hope that helps! Best, DFJ
Hollyhocks are incredibly resillient. We live in a high clay soil area and they do great. They will drop their seed pods once the seed pods and seeds dry and will self seed like crazy. You will have tons of them of all colors. Have Fun!! I certainly do. Best to you, Dirt Farmer Maggie
Toni, indeed they come back year after year. They are short-lived perennials, and are so prolific that you won't notice is a plant dies out since there are others taking its place. They are leafing out like crazy around here in our yardscape now and it won't be long until we have lots of color from them. Thanks for watching our video! Best, DFJ
Hi Rathod. I have never purchased hollyhock seeds. They "self seed" by dropping their seed pods in the fall the reseeding the bed for the coming spring so we have always had more than we really want in our beds. I would look on line for seed companies and see what you can find. Thanks for watching and commenting. Best, DFM
Carmen, thanks for watching our video and taking time to write. You can buy hollyhock seeds from many seed companies. When you do, you can select the color and characteristics you like. Or, you can get them at the end of the season from other people who are growing them. They produce a LOT of seed, and once you get them going, they will readily self-seed each year. I nope this helps - best regards, DFJ
Xil, as Linda Young indicates, the first year or early on, they may start slow, but give them time. They are worth the wait, and once you get them going, you'll be glad you did. Hollyhocks are biennial, meaning their individual plant life cycle is 2 years. The first year the plant grows, the second year it blooms and dies off come cold weather, but liberally seeds the area around it. Let me know how it turns out end of season. ?Best, DFJ
Maria, because hollyhocks have a long tap root, they don't tend to transplant well, although DirtFarmerMaggie has proven me wrong a few times on this one. They tend to be able to transplant, with some set back for a couple of weeks, if there are a generous amount of side roots developed as well as the center tap. You can dig around one of your transplants and see if you see any growth beginning, or if they have simply died and are rotting. You'll get your answer. Thanks for watching and writing! Best, DFJ
As much as I did find this video enjoyable, I am always looking for a little more in depth information about the plant. What pests and diseases does the hollyhock contend with and how can I avoid them? I have seen some before that had very ratty, bug-eaten leaves and I enjoy a good organic solution to prevent this problem. I know there are some basic ones but I don't know what the hollyhock contends with as its own species. Also, the variety that I just bought and planted is the yellow double version. Will the pollinators be able to reach the stamens and stigma through the double petals or will I have to pollinate these myself if I want a crop of seeds for future plantings? Any other advice such as staking suggestions would be appreciated. Your varieties seem medium-tall, while the package that I bought shows a 4-6 foot range. Do they need staking or do they possess a thick and woody stem that can carry the plant's weight?
One more thing: Are they a plant that does well with continuous feeding or do they thrive on neglect? If they do enjoy fertilizer, what nutrient balance is best?
@@grettalemabouchou6779 Sometimes a good way to approach life is to ask questions. It's more interactive and generally more stimulating and builds relationships. Not everything has to be solved by isolated research. Also considerable is asking for advice and then following the advice. There's a lot to be learned via simple communication. And I like getting peoples' actual experiences beyond the literature.
I thought you ask good questions 😉I was waiting for a answer... and research is best found in the knowledge from experience not just books 😵or internet.
Hi Phillip. Hollyhocks are very prolific and spread everywhere if you're not careful. They self seed when their seed pods (at the top of the plants) drop off when dry in the fall. We keep them watered with all the other flowers in our beds but don't really give them fertilizer. Their leaves do get ratty looking towards the end of the season. This is not due to bugs, rather to a condition caused rust and sometimes when it is humid, powdery mildew. It's time around here for us to cut down all the spend bloom stalks and discard them. To help prevent the spread of rust, it's best not to compost these stalks. This allows you to get rid of the prolific amount of seeds as well. Sorry it took so long to respond. The YT platform doesn't always notify us when we get questions or responses. Thanks for watching our video! - DFM
My hollyhocks grow well over 8 ft high and I've cross seeded so now I expect 10+ varieties in color. Can anyone recommend the best way to transplant them? How far down do I need to dig and how much of a ball of dirt should go with each plant to its new home?
Hi Melanie. To be honest, we have SO MANY hollyhocks from years of multiplying that I have never even tried to transplant one. But I would guess that with an ample root ball in tact, they would transplant just fine. They are SO HARDY it's almost impossible to kill them! Best to you, DFM
Hi Lleb Lee. They do look similar but be aware that Hollyhocks stalks drop a LOT of seeds and will spread because of this. I let them come up in the spring and if they are not in a good spot, I just pull them. Easier to thin the crop than to plant more!! Best to you. DFM
