Delphinium
Delphinium are a wonderful perennial and they are such a great way to bring blue into your farm’s color palette over a long season.
I’ve alway had trouble growing delphinium from seed. I just haven’t cracked the code for that one with the set ups that I have here. Larkspur— I got that! But it’s perennial friend has never germinated well for me.
So, I order plugs. We get ours from Farmer Bailey. Canadian (and US) growers can get delphinium from Jolly Farmer.
The plants in this video we added to out farm early last summer. They bloomed their first season and offered successions into the colder temps when many flowers were getting knocked off by cold. The delphinium and our perennial asters are some of our latest bloomers outside without cover.
We have a row of delphinium in an unheated tunnel and a couple rows outside.
My favorite delphinium is Astolot (it’s a lavender-purple color). We also grow the Pacific Giants series and the whispy Bella Donna, Casa Blanca, and Cliveden Beauty varieties.
These are a fantastic flowers for large-scale event work. You may find that the un-opened flower buds droop at the top of the stems. I just snip off the tips to avoid that “droopy” look in my designs.
We also use the delphinium florets routinely in small personal flower elements like boutonnieres, corsages, and flower crowns. The flowers hold up well separately of the stems.
If you’re looking for a true “blue” flower with staying power and don’t want to mess with tangled webs of forget me nots and tweedia get yourself some delphinium.
Our biggest challenge is cyclamen mite. Cyclamen mite infestations are hard to beat. And you’ll probably find that it’s best to remove an infected plant before the mites spread and destroy other plantCyclmen mite damage on delphiniums looks like crispy brown/burnt and wrinkled foliage and blackened, distorted flowers/flower spikes. Plants that have a cyclament mite problem quickly produce un-useable flowers. So, really - don’t hold on to them. It’s not worth it.
We sort of consider delphinium to be short-lived perennials, understanding that the mite will probably sneak in and over time we’ll want to just start them over in a different bed somewhere else on the property.
Other pests that can affect delphinium:
aphids
cutworms
leafminers
borers
root-knot nematodes
Diseases affecting delphinium:
powdery mildew
“aster yellows”
crown rot
black leaf spot
As I mentioned before - our only real problem for delphinium here are the cyclamen mites. They are still worth growing, in my opinion, even if we have to replace them every few years. I know they can be very long lasting for some growers.