Thursday, July 29, 2010

Hola 'Senorita'

Zinnia 'Senorita' was introduced by Burpee in 1968 as part of the 'Burpeeana Giants' zinnia series, she graced the cover of the Burpee catalog that same year. I first grew her sometime in the late 1980's. Crosman Seed Co. was selling five packs of cactus zinnia seed for .99 cents. The varieties were 'Floradale Scarlet', 'Sunny Boy', 'Snowtime','Springtime' and 'Senorita'. I faithfully purchased this collection all through the 90's, the last year being 1999. In 2000 they dropped the collection and 'Senorita'.


She became one of my all time favorite zinnia's. Large, pointed and/ or twisted petals in a gorgeous shade of salmon rose, very hard to capture on film. The plants topped out at about three feet and she never had a bad year. 2003 was the last year I could coax her seed into germinating. Needless to say that every year since I scoured the internet hoping I could find her, no such luck. Of course, I still tried to germinate a few of the old seed every year with no success...


This spring I had great success germinating some zinnia seed from 2002. This spurred me on to start way to many varieties of zinnia. One was a packet of 'Rose Pink Giant Cactus' zinnia from Crosman's dated 2008. Germination was excellent, and the five pellets of seedlings were crammed into a twelve in pot in June. Last week they started to bloom. I couldn't decide if my eyes were playing tricks on me, so I went and got a bloom from another salmon zinnia to compare. I actually let out a whoop of joy! At long last here was my 'Senorita'! Later on I began kicking myself. Here she was under my nose all the time. I will definitely be saving seed this year and still have almost a full packet left. Now, has anybody seen 'Cherry Buttons'?...

Here she is in all her glory...





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