Winter pansies

[redser]

Hi,
Just put my bedding plants in and I'm thinking of sowing for winter colour. Decided to keep it simple and go for a carpet of winter pansies. Can anyone recommend a type? Do all pansies do ok over winter? If possible would you have an actual name that you sow, like from a well known seed company that I could easily pick up?

Thanks a lot!

[Jardiniere]

no-one has replied - looks like no-one is a pansy fancier! I have never grown a pansy from seed - but do grow them in the winter .....from plants ..but I don't know any names! Sorry....anyway this reply bumps up your post - maybe someone else will come along....

[veggiechicken]

I have grown them from seed, just because I like their smiley faces - but its any variety for which I have free seeds!
You may find this of interest http://www.growfruitandveg.co.uk/gra...ies_23423.html

[redser]

Thanks to both of you. That's exactly what I wanted to know veggiechicken, thanks

[Feral007]

Sorry, I have pansies and violas in my garden, grown from small plants tho. They are cracking on in the cold weather and cheering me up - there isn't much else doing a lot out there atm.

[Two_Sheds]

Violas tend to do better than pansies, ime

They're easy to grow from seed, but you won't have colour in the depths of winter: like nearly everything else, they both have a little rest when it's cold & dark and come back to life in late winter/early spring

[eirish]

I don't know about varieties, but they can be pretty tough. My parents have stories about them staying green under solid ice in Maine. And a couple of years ago I bought some reduced to 25p intending to put them in pots. Never got around to it so they stayed in their little polystyrene modules all winter, no cosseting, no watering, nothing. About February they started blooming their little heads off!

[tamsin]

It probably depends where you are and where they are, we had some in pots tucked next to the house that flowered all winter, even when they were poking through snow.