Updated 01/31/2011 — The lucky winner is Jenna Z. If you didn’t win and would like to try again, please visit Cold Climate Gardening where Kathy is also sponsoring a giveaway of seeds from Botanical Interests!
How about some free seeds to start off a year of wildflowers in your garden?
And a calendar beautifully illustrated with botanical drawings to count down the days until spring?
And a mouse pad to keep your mouse moving smoothly as you click around the web reading Wildflower Wednesday posts and looking for seeds?
How about it, indeed!
Botanical Interests is sponsoring this giveaway which features a calendar, a mouse pad, and two seed mixes that will no doubt delight you with many blooms through summer and fall.
The first seed mix, “Save the Bees“, includes annual and perennial flowers and even some herbs chosen especially to attract bees and other pollinators.
The other seed mix, “Water-wise“, includes annual and perennial flowers that are drought-tolerant and by the way, they’ll attract bees and pollinators, too.
Using a seed mix is a great way start a wildflower garden, one that will provide enjoyment and surprises not only the first season of sowing, but for many seasons after that.
In addition to the two seed mixes offered in this giveaway, Botanical Interests also offers several other seed mixes including the Songbird Mix, Bring Home the Butterflies Mix, Hummingbird Haven, and the very intriguing Fairy Meadow Mix. (Hmmm… a mix of flowers that attracts garden fairies? Very intriguing…)
It’s easy to enter this giveaway! Just leave a comment below telling us about your favorite wildflower. That’s it!
Enter by Monday, January 31st at 9 pm EST and maybe you’ll start February with two free seed mixes, a calendar and a mouse pad.
(Giveaway open to U.S. and Canadian residents, 18 years and older, one entry per person. Please include your email address in your comment (disguised along the lines of “name AT gmail dot com”) or make sure your comment will lead me to a blog or website where I can find your email address. Winner will be chosen by random drawing.)
(Wildflower Wednesdays is sponsored by Gail at Clay and Limestone. Visit her blog to find links to others who are joining in this once a month event promoting wildflowers in and out of the garden.)
poppies, poppies, poppies, poppies, poppies!!
…if peonies were a wildflower they would win though…
My favorite wildflower is pretty common, but then, so am I! It's Echinacea purpurea/purple coneflower. Birds love the seeds, butterflies love the flowers!
poppies for sure and then sunflowers
Favourite? The asters we call "Farewell summers" – nice purple-blue asters that bloom, along with goldenrod, at the end of the summer (obviously!). I love seeing that colour combination every fall 🙂
Just one favorite, we can't have several? That is too hard! That Fairy Mix sounds perfect, I will look into that one, thanks Carol!
Frances
Like I could choose just one? Oh, all right then, I'll say Thalictrum/anemonella thalictroides. I can't even say why, they just charm me. Cute little denizens of the shade, bloom for a long time in spring, then often disappear. That's it. Not butterfly or hummingbird magnets, no imposing presence, no fancy foliage all season.
My favorite wildflower~That's easy it's Phlox pilosa~the Practically Perfect Pink Phlox~Glad you joined the celebration! gail
ONE of my favorite spring wildflowers is Salvia lyrata (Lyre-leaf sage). I did a profile on this plant last spring (http://growerjim.blogspot.com/2010/04/salvia-lyrata-lyre-leaf-sage.html).
jim.f at juno dot com.
I love Chicory (Cichorium intybus). As a child I saw it on the roadside and a vacant lot next door. Beautiful blue blooms.
Thanks.
Oooooh, hepatica! The surprise mini bouquet of flowers emerging from a pile of dead leaves…and then the treasure hunt that ensues to find the green hearts underneath. Now I've got spring fever again!
boy that is a tough decision…I would say that if I look out over my wildflower meadow I really love all the rudbeckias with those bright yellow faces and the browns and oranges mixed in…they stay long and provide so much for all the pollinators and birds…and they self seed…
I too have a hard time deciding on a favorite, but I'm going to go with purple coneflower – I just love that beautiful pop of color jumping out of my butterfly garden.
I now live in Wisconsin and driving down the country roads I see alot of "Black Eyed Susans" I love them–they remind me of sunshine
Echinacea (Purple Cone FLower) is by far my favorite wild flower. Cora Reef, Bee Balm is a close second. I love the smell of it. I throw a handful of the flower in my truck to freshen it up. It sure beats the chemical sprays they use at the car wash.
Canadian columbine, nodding wild onion, yellow pimpernel…geez I can't decide!
I love the blanket flower (Gaillardia aristata)simply because I love the bright, vibrant color and the yellow tips on the petals make me happy. How can you not smile when you see one?
My favorite wildflower is the daisy.Thanks for the giveaway:)
kats7960@gmail.com
I'm still seeing surprises from the wildflower seeds I planted three years ago including poppies.
I think my favorite would be daisies.
Thanks for hosting the giveaway!
I like those blue corn flowers and the little poppies
We have beautiful Devil's Paintbrush around here in the Spring that I love, they are so bright
One of my favorites is columbine. I have orange and purple varieties in my backyard!
My favourite wildflower? Tough choice! I think it's a tie between bloodroot (Sanguinaria canadensis) and rampion / harebell (Campanula rapunculus / rotundifolia).
The campanula, I first spotted on a hike through a wild part of a city park. I am still not sure which species I saw, since both are so similarly described in my Googling. Anyone have a hint on telling the difference?
And I've never seen a bloodroot in the wild, but from the pictures I've seen, I know that I must have them in my garden!
Oh yes, my email! It's Dirt.Gently over at Google's email service.
oh nice giveaway! thanks for the opportunity!
My favorite wildflower is the sunflower 🙂 yes, it's a wildflower! I love it because of all the different varieties there are, especially the ones with multiple blooms on one plant. They just make me feel happy.
Bluebonnets of course.
I'm with TexMike.. Bluebonnets, of course!
But I like the Indian Paitbrush as well, and passionflowers hold a special place in my heart.
Even though I don't live in Texas anymore, I'd have to agree with TexMike, Texas Bluebonnets (Lupine texensis) are spectacular. And a close second would be Rudebeckia "goldstrum".
My favorite (currently) is Missouri Ironweed (Vernonia missurica). It gets so tall and purplse and blooms fairly late so it provides a lot color and stature in my garden.
Kristi
A flower I picked in my childhood on the farm; yellow buttercups. They grew in the ditches around the farm, bright and numerous for the pickin'. Flowers for birds, bees and butterflies are what I aim for!gischatusfamilydotnet.. Thanks Carol!
I always loved wild strawberry flowers- and the strawberry leaves are lovely too.
writer61@yahoo.com
I always loved wild strawberry flowers- and the strawberry leaves are lovely too.
writer61@yahoo.com
I love salvias, poppies and sunflowers! They are so pretty Together! 4bratz2luv@gmail.com
Trilliums. They're magical. You can never have too many of them. Every summer I look for seedlings to move to new parts of the garden. Last week I couldn't wait. I cut some chunks off the edges of my biggest clump and replanted then under the rhodies where anyone coming to the front door can see them.
Deirdre-sillakim at aol dot com.
Trientalis borealis, star flower, it's a sweet, dainty thing I remember growing in the woods when I grew up. I've discovered as an adult that it runs like crazy, but who cares?
Froupd at aol dot com
It's a tie between california poppies and nasturtiums.
Climbing nasturtiums for sure.
Sambucus/Elderberry, I love my elderberries for the great job they do at stabilizing my waterfront, for giving the robins a place to nest, for the pretty spring flowers, and the great jelly that I get to make with my nephews in the fall, and the winter shelter they give the wild birds when they come to my feeders in the winter.
Thanks for the chance at more seeds!
T in Coldwater
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would love to have you link up to Cottage Flora Thursdays…I'm looking for others that have a love of gardening to share posts with. Hope to see you! xoox
Wild rose which is the provincial flower of Alberta. It has a lovely fragrance when it blooms in June.
BTW, love your blog! I read it all the time but this is my first time commenting (email is anjalirehill at gmail dot com).
Lady Slippers, so amazing and the state flower of MN!!
Being a Kansas girl, definitely sunflowers. 🙂
I'm from Texas. It has to be the bluebonnet of course,
! Miles and miles of them.
I love Joe Pye Weed!
Wild forest violets are my favorite. I used to love to pick them as a little child and now they remind me of those first warm spring days.
My favorite is the pink native azalea blooms! They bloom like mad in the pine fields around here!
jenna_zeigler at yahoo dot com
I love the Beebalm!! I have it planted strategically throughout my vegetable garden. It always brings in the most beautiful assortment of butterflies, bumblebees and hummingbirds.
I love the flower bitterroot – it's not only beautiful, but it's helped so many Montanans throughout history.
My favorite herb is lavender. 🙂
My email: mtretter at hotmail dot com.
P.S.
My 7 year old would like to know if the Fairy Garden mix is good for zone 4. ? 🙂
Trillium and Wood Violets! I also use the flowers of the violets to make jelly – it's a beautiful amethyst color and tastes like a very mild honey.
Snowdrops (here in the northeast, they're just about the first ones to arrive). Thanks!
Our favorite would be the Oxeye Daisy. Long lasting, and makes for a great cut flower. @SolakNC on Twitter
Oh poppies and daisies – the happiest flowers! Love them….but then again I do love almost any flower (marigolds and geraniums are the exceptions) @Love2Sail (twitter)
my pick is the old reliable Dandy Lion. Never fails to come back every year and it brings friends!Denise
my favourite would definitely be buttercups or maybe daisies, those small white flowers with yellow middles that are so common in English lawns. It is one thing I miss since moving to Ohio, lawns here still have weeds but they aren't the pretty ones I am used too 🙂
My fav is Gaillardia or Blanketflower. I garden in Nevada and it provides a lot of color and stands up to the hot, dry summers.
jenfox79 at sbcglobal dot net.
Since I grew up in colorado, I gotta say that my favorite wildflower is the columbine.
Gardeninginaustin.blogspot.com
Katina underscore Butler at hotmail
Yes, I know it is invasive, but cut-leaved teasel is so darned amazing! Colonies of plants six feet tall with showy white spikes of flowers that produce the prickly teasel–so tactile and dramatic in flower arrangements. One plant can produce as many as 2000 seeds, which can remain viable for two years. The seeds have a 30-80% germination rate. If you cut down teasel before it forms the flower spike, it just grows back. If you cut it after the flower appears, the seed can still ripen on the stalk.
When the teasel dies back, it leaves a large, bare spot that provides a nursery for its seedlings (awwwwwww!). It grows well in disturbed ground and follows highways, which is how I spotted it. Mowing just spreads the seed, running water spreads the seed… Its tap root can be two feet long, so you have to burn it in the spring and then dig it out. Grow, teasel, grow!!!
I would have to say poppies….when I see them it always reminds me of our neighbor, Olga, that lived next door to us when my husband and I were first married. She had them throughout her garden as she let them free seed. The were beautifully chaotic!
No indecision here–the purple coneflower is my favorite hands down. But for something that truly grows wild around here, I'd pick the wild carrot or Queen Anne's Lace.
Hard to pick just one but I guess I'll go with Edelweiss.
My favorites always vary from season to season, but currently my favorite is the jewelweed, in the impatiens family. It's also known as touch-me-not as the seed pod pops open and shoots the seeds out if you touch it.
My favorite flowers at this particular moment are the nasturtiums, edible flowers! We harvested seeds from last year and we planted in another area of our yard. Last years flowers planted seeds and are growing as I write this! Love the color, the crawling vine quality and of course the edibility!
Cosmos, bright orange, of course.
buttercups
ladcraig at hotmail dot com
I love herbs so some of my favorite wildflowers are Mullein and Red Clover.
cyclona66 at aol dot com
I love daisys. They make me feel happy.
rhondastruthers atyahoo.ca
Foxglove is my favorite. It's so pretty and helpful!
smchester at gmail dot com
I've always liked Indian Blanket flowers
crested dwarf iris–so pretty and dainty in the spring
cinco_00 at yahoo dot com
I live in Texas and in the spring if we get enough rain, wooded areas can be filled with wine cups. They are my favorite wildflowers.
sparkofutterance(at)hotmail(dot)com
Honeysuckle is by far the best wildflower in the world far as I'm concerned.
alanafunmail at yahoo dot com
Sunflowers are my favorite.. great giveaway..
I like the Wild Purple Shooting Stars you can find here in Washington State.
My favorite wildflower is Queen Anne's Lace. It is so light and elegant! We used to pick them and stem dye with colored water!!!
What a fun win of seeds as the snow is following!!!!
lknott@partnercom.net
I don't know the name of the wildflowers here in Iowa, I just know that in the spring they are beautiful and give me hope for the new year. But I do love poppies, and in my small town people plant alot of daffadels(sp).
i love black eyed susans
susansmoaks at gmail dot com
My favorite wildflower is a daisy
galyettina(ay)yahoo(dot)com
My favorite wildflower is the Lily of the valley
devotus(at)yahoo(dot)com
My favourites are purple cone flower, black eyed susan and sun flowers!
sona.s2011(at)yahoo(dot)com
I just love sunflowers! There are so many different kinds, but the coolest are the huge ones. I accidentally grew some in my backyard when the birdfeeder overflowed. 🙂
heatherpooh (hotmail)