... it will either be utterly awesome or a mess!

I took the frame of my tropical greenhouse and put twine and deer netting over it (shouldn't have done that with my broken ribs and paid dearly for it the next day). I sowed a lot of mixed seeds from communal frames of previous years and some of my less than stellar F series crosses in hopes that something interesting might pop up. I wasn't judicious about it, just threw everything into some cells and of course they ALL came up. What you see planted is about 2/3's of what came up. The rest went into a long window box and I'll be doing a Gerris and pruning them back into bushes.

I was really wanting some MG's this year but with moving house just didn't have time to set up the arches so this was the next best thing. Next year I'll get serious.

Should be interesting at the very least. Will they be able to meet in the middle? I usually do mine on either side of an arched stock panel and it makes a really pretty tunnel. Sigh, not this year, tho. I only have a few plants in the house.

That's what I'm hoping to do - have them meet in the middle. Here is a list of the OP Frame seeds I'm using - F1's of both:

Double Blue Picotee X Mini Bar Rose F2, F3, F4,
Platycodon Blue X Fujishibori
Grey Fog
Rose Silk
Rose Silk X Fujishibori
Mini Bar Rose,
NOID Blues & Pinks

and

Rose Silk
Hanafubuki
Sunsmile Purple
Platycodoon Blue
Grandpa Ott
Cardinal Climber Yellow

It will certainly be colorful! Wait, there is a Yellow Cardinal Climber? (Heh, kind of a contradiction there.)

Well yes .. I know it won't cross but gosh .. it IS a bright yellow so if it manages to survive the mess it will be like a beacon of sorts!

Wanted to add that if anyone is interested in doing grow outs of my communal OP Frames I'll be happy to send seeds .. all I ask is pictures of the more interesting crosses and at least 10 seeds.

No, I just meant to ask if there actually WAS a yellow Cardinal Climber, as in Ipomoea sloteri? I've never heard of one. Sounds wonderful!

Actually I'm thinking it is the I sloteri without the orange - a sport or something. I should have tagged it and collected seeds from it to see if it would breed true and with all the other grow outs I've done with this original F1 set of seeds, never had one show up. I do know however that this F1 grow out definitely has some in it since the leaves are so distinctive. I'm curious to know which way it will go.

Here is the only picture I have of it - it's from 2010.

It would be very cool if you could reliably produce the yellow ones! I love the leaves of the I. sloteri; they look very nice mixed in with the usual MG foliage. I had one mixed in with some I. purpurea one year (totally by accident) and it looked great!

They've started the climb from 'base camp'. It's been so bloody hot here the last week - upper 90's even 100's with no rain - even though I water everyday, everything seems to be growing in slow motion ... according to the weather guys, this coming week is even going to be worse.

It's interesting how some just shoot up like a rocket and some take their time, I also think the shorter ones are in shade longer than the taller ones.

The yellow 'Cardinal Climber' looks like Ipomoea hederifolia var. lutea. If it is it self sows reliably.

Just checked my seed catalog and I have it, but Emma sent me the seeds 3 years after this batch of F1's was collected. Weird.