Hi Céline, " But as I remember zinnia florets, I guess that they have the both in the same flower right ? Can I use a paintbrush as I do with the zucchinis ? ( a special for zinnia ) " Yes, zinnia blooms all have the female parts (stigmas) and frequently also have the male pollen bearing parts ( pollen florets). The stigmas are attached at the base of each petal, which is attached to the seed jacket, which is attached to the central cone of the bloom. Botanists sometimes refer to a zinnia bloom as a capitula. and the petals as ligules. But we are not botanists, so we will talk of blooms and petals. The pollen-bearing florets arise in the center of the bloom. You can use an artists paintbrush to transfer pollen from the florets to the stigmas, thus accomplishing pollination or cross-pollination. You can load your brush simply by touching the pile of pollen that appears in the center of a floret. Then touch the brush to the stigmas to apply pollen to them. Not that you have control over it, but a single grain of pollen can be sufficient.A successfully pollinated stigma will shrivel and die within a day or two. Un-pollinated stigmas will remain yellow and receptive for over a week, so you will have several opportunities to get them pollinated. After the stigma dies the embryo in the seed jacket starts to grow and matures as a green seed in about a month. You can pick green seeds and plant them immediately to start a second generation of zinnias, or you can dry them and then store them for use at a later time. If you choose to start a second generation of zinnias immediately, you will need to "breach" the green seed coat, because it is still alive and impervious to water. You can use a hobby knife or scalpel to provide a water entry route to the green seed in several ways.You can remove the embryos entirely and plant just zinnia embryos. I have planted as many as a flat of zinnia embryos at a time, and the embryos will emerge in a day or two for a really fast start of a second generation. By also growing zinnias indoors during the Winter, I get as many as four generations of zinnias each year, which speeds up my zinnia breeding goals. Even if you aren't growing a quick second generation, the green seed technique has several advantages, including that it helps avoid losses to seed-eating birds. " oh... Do you pinch your plant to get them more bushy and have more flowers ? If yes, when do you do it ? " If you aren't in a hurry to do a first-bloom culling, as I usually am, pinching zinnias is good cultural practice. Be sure to have at least one pair of true leaves before you pinch the growing point. You can get different effects by pinching after the second or third pair of leaves, or even more. You could wait for the appearance of the central flower bud, and pinch it. And, for even bushier zinnia plants, you can also pinch some or all of the lateral branches that form. I do invite your participation and pictures over in the "It can be fun to breed your own zinnias" forum. ZM

I second LizaLily on the first step being to get your daughter to choose her colors. You'll also want to discuss her preference in flowers. She may adore the idea of fall color scheme in mums, but then again she may not. (Judging by my experience with my daughters, she will feel her life is not complete unless she has the pink rose that only blooms between June 6 and June 12 of even-numbered years.) Don't ignore the possibility of dried flowers. She may feel that the more delicate, muted colors of some dried flowers makes for a more romantic feel. I would also suggest that you consider all the other things that will be happening in preparation for the wedding and not make this onerous for yourself. It's a happy day and you'll want to enjoy it. Ray

Joan, these are incredible! I had this lens on my "wish list" so glad to see some actual photos taken with it! Now I REALLY want the lens! Penny

Hi Alex, " How is the indoor garden going, ZM? Any especially outstanding recombinants you have to share? " My indoor garden is just getting started. I have a few seedlings getting their first true leaves, but many are just in the cotyledon stage. My plantings so far have focused on getting F2 recombinants with the Extreme Uproll feature, and a few choice exotic specimens. My further indoor plantings will look forward to what I want to accomplish next year outdoors. Next year I intend to apply some lessons learned this year. For the last few years I have been planting standardized beds 4 feet wide with four rows spaced 16 inches apart.Those rows in that picture have been recently weeded. I don't like to stoop over to weed, and kneeling is not my favorite thing either, Although sometimes kneeling is necessary in some hand weeding situations. This last year I did as much weeding as I could from a seated position using a little adjustable chair.My son avoided a lot of weeding in his tomatoes and peppers by laying down landscape cloth. That seemed to work well for him, although he found that weeds could penetrate the cheaper grade of cloth. However the 15-year cloth cost a bit more, but worked well. He grew his tomatoes and peppers in cages. Next year he is considering the use of Cattle Panels for tomato support. I will continue to use small cages for my breeder zinnia specimens.I didn't consider the use of landscape cloth in my rows, because they are so close together. For next year I am considering omitting the middle two rows and just have two rows 4 feet apart. That might make landscape cloth feasible for me, and even if I don't use the cloth, I will have better accessibility for weeding the two-row beds with 4 feet between the rows. My strategy for now is to flesh out my plans for next year's zinnia garden (including what kinds of zinnias to grow) and then use my indoor project to supply the seeds to support those plans. Your Sunflower Path and House look very inviting. Wider might be better. It looks like you have a good variety of tall sunflowers. More later. ZM