Plants flowers are the most attractive part of a gardening plant. Their range and shades of colours, their shapes and sometimes their fragrance are all what attract you to your favourite gardening plants.
But, if plants where without flowers many of them would never be grown, why?
Because they would just be different unassuming sizes, shapes and different shades of greens.
Just picture an Iris without it's flowers, what would you have? No more than sabre shaped leaves standing upright.
Or imagine a rose without flowers, it would just be a framework of branches with thorns and green leaves. You wouldn't give it a second look, would you?
But nature did not adorn plants with beautiful flowers for your benefit. A plants flower has one special purpose.
And that is to ensure the plants survival for future generations.
A flower is simply modified and highly coloured leaves designed to attract and encourage passing insects to visit.
The whole game plan of plants flowers is getting insects to carry pollen from another plant and deposit it on the pistils of it's own flowers to start the initial fertilisation process.
As a further enticement to get some insects to visit, most highly coloured flowers produce nectar at the base of the corolla.
As insects search for the nectar in a flower they brush against the pollen which adheres to their bodies until they visit another flower where the sticky tips of the pistils, stigmas, drag it off their bodies so it can be used to fertilise the seeds.
So that's why nature gave plants flowers, so they can reproduce.
And you can take advantage of the flowers nature gave plants, in more ways than one.
You can enjoy their beauty, splendour and sometimes their aromatic fragrance.
But you can enjoy them not just for their beauty, splendour and sometimes their aromatic fragrance, you can also enjoy them for the new plants they can give you absolutely free.
After you have enjoyed the flowers beauty and fragrance at the end of the flowering season the flowers will fade, wilt and eventually fall away.
This leaves a pod full of ripening seeds just waiting to burst open and scatter the seeds far and wide.
Now you can take advantage of this in one of two ways.
You can collect the seeds as they ripen or you can let the seeds scatter, leave them to germinate where thy fall and then dig up the seedlings to plant in pots or in your garden.
If you want to collect the seeds it's really quite simple. You to do this just before the seed pods bursts open, scattering the seeds in the process.
The seedpods will only open when the seeds inside are ripe, this gives the seeds the best chance of germinating, unripe seeds do not germinate.
You can normally tell when a seedpod is ripe and ready to open by the colour. It will change from green to a greyish brown or light brown colour. It will also start to slightly open, the top begins to just peel back.
Now this is the time to collect the seedpods, but make sure it is on a dry day, don't collect them if they are wet, they will rot. Once picked place them in a closed paper bag and keep them somewhere warm and dry. In a day or so the pods will have fully opened realising the ripe seeds.
Discard the pod and other material and save the seeds in a paper bag, a paper envelope is ideal for this, and keep them in a cool dry place until next spring.
Sow them next year from March through to May in trays, flats, or pots of seed compost and keep them in a warm place. Keep the compost just wet, not saturated or waterlogged. Place the trays, flats, or pots in a sealed plastic bag, this will retain the moisture.
As soon as the seeds germinate transplant them into individual pots filled with potting compost. Grow them on until they are large enough to plant out in your garden and all danger of frost has passed.
If you have left the seedpods on the plant, to open naturally, and scatter the seeds, they will germinate early next spring wherever they have landed.
All you have to do then is carefully dig up the seedlings making sure not to damage any roots or stems in the process. Plant them into pots of potting compost and grow them on.
If the seedlings are large enough you can plant them in your garden where you want them grow on and flower.
You can do this year after year after year.
So take advantage of the beauty nature provides, but also get yourself some plants free for life!
Chris and Alison are successful and experienced gardeners specializing in plant propagation. For all the information you need on propagating and growing your favorite gardening plants successfully visit plants-free-for-life
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