I have all the heart eyes for zinnias. They are an annual flower, and I have enjoyed them for the last two summers. Why do I love these flowers so much?
Bright and Full of Color
Zinnias can be grown in a mixture of colors. They offer happy bright colors wherever they reside. They come in primary colors, pinks and pale colors of various sizes and petal lengths.
In addition to the flowers being pleasing to the eye, mixing these bright flowers draws pollinators to your garden. Your garden gets pollinated and you can rest well at night knowing you contributed to keeping pollinators healthy. Butterflies especially love zinnias and will flock to your garden.
Grow From Seed
Zinnias are a great flower to grow from seed. Besides sunflowers, I have struggled to grow other flowers from seed, but I have no issue with zinnias. Growing from seed is exceptionally cheaper. Zinnias do like warm weather and a warm ground so it is best to wait closer to May to sew your seeds depending on your zone.
Harvesting zinnia seeds are also very easy. Throughout the season, I pluck wilting flowers of my favorite colors and throw them in a bin in dark place to dry. I have also collected my favorite blooms at the end of the season. I prefer to leave my bin somewhere in my garage as some bugs may lay eggs in the flower pods resulting in small moths to grow as the flowers dry out.
My kids love to harvest zinnia seeds close to Christmas. By Christmas, the seeds are good and dry. Simply pluck the old dried petals away from the pods and dark hard triangular seeds should be present. Place in a bag or envelope to store.
To take harvesting seeds a step further, give them away as holiday gifts. Craft stores often have very small envelopes that can be purchased and decorated for seed placement.
Enjoy Inside and Outside
Not only do zinnias offer bright colors outside to enjoy, but they will continue to make and produce flowers if they are cut. At first, I was hesitant to cut my flowers because I wanted them to look healthy in my yard until I learned they would only make more flowers if I did cut them. So, cut away, place in a vase and take them inside to enjoy! Some seasons, we have two vases full of zinnias from July to October in our home as well as sharing occasionally with neighbors and friends. One of our neighbors went through a very difficult loss, and it gave us the joy to be able to leave her bright flowers at her stoop every other week.
To read other benefits of gardening check out this post.
Low Maintenance
Best of all, zinnias are very low maintenance. During drought and extremely high temperatures last August and September, my zinnias thrived. Other plants wilted and some died, but my zinnias continued to bloom and thrive with little watering. As long as I cut the flowers and sprinkled a little 10-10-10 fertilizer every couple of weeks at their base, the flowers required little other attention.
