Ask Flora-Chocolate Gardens

28 Feb Ask Flora-Chocolate Gardens

Dear Flora,

I want to plan for some new, dark plants within the next couple of years. I will plant them against my white house walls and be the envy of my neighborhood. Any suggestions?

– Wants the Neighbors Stopping

Dear Wants the Neighbors Stopping (and Gabbing),

You simply MUST keep an eye on the Chocolate Flower Farm and their development of brand-new plants. They are busy hand-pollinating and collecting seeds to make some new conversation starters-guaranteed. Just try and keep your neighbors from snagging a cut! Here are the ones that co-owner, Marie, reports are in progress:

Delphinium elatum ‘Kissed By Chocolate’-Two years ago they purchased 350 Delphinium elatum ‘Black Shades’-fabulous English Delphiniums in a wide range of colors with brown and/or black coloring. Some were white with soft brushes of chocolate so they collected seed from the best of the best. Chocolate Flower Farm hand-selects them and continues to refine the strain and cull all of those that do not have the gentle strokes of chocolate on white.

Sunflower ‘BOB’-BOB stands for “Bordering on Black” and is their special sunflower that they have been hand-selecting seed from for the past three years to create the darkest sunflower possible. They will have a whole field of BOB this year and it will be quite a sight!

Nicotiana ‘Hot Chocolate’ (improved strain)-The strain of Nicotiana named “Hot Chocolate” was introduced in 2005 from a sport of Nicotiana langsdorfii by a competitor but it was inconsistent and there were many plants that were pink instead of maroon. For the past two years the Chocolate Flower Farm has been selecting the darkest to harvest seed from and culling all that are not a dark, dark mahogany color. Now, dear readers, they need a name for the improved strain and they want your help! They are considering “Dark & Sassy”, although having chocolate in the name would be nice too. Hmmm..how about “Dark Chocolate”? Please comment if you have an idea.

Viola-New chocolate strain, not yet named. They had an amazing sport of Viola ‘Velour Frosted Chocolate’ that they are trying to replicate – it has a much larger flower than the named variety and is much more chocolate in color.

For 2008, The Chocolate Flower Farm plans to work on Chocolate baptisia, Calendula, Zinnia, Marigold and others.

Plan your chocolate garden now with these beauties!

-Flora