Grow Your Morning Glory

                Morning glory is a kind of vine that has beautiful flower. It belongs to annual plant because this plant will died after blooming. It can survive approximately 3 – 4 months. There are many kinds of morning glory. The most known are moonflower (Ipomoea alba), mexican morning glory (Ipomoea purpurea), and japanese morning glory (Ipomoea nil).

            Growing morning glory is very easy. This kind of flower is recommended for the beginner in gardening. It doesn’t need special treatment and heat tolerance. There are some steps to grow morning glory.What you need to prepare before planting morning glory are the seeds of morning glories, soil, and pots.

            First, soak the seeds in fresh water about 6 – 12 hours. Seeds of morning glories are hard. Therefore, soaking the seeds in water can help to germinate quickly. This is an optional step. So, if you won’t do this, you can skip this step.

            Next, plant each seed in shallow holes about 1.5 cm deep in permanent place or pot.Plant morning glory in a seed tray is not recommended, because it can’t be adapted well if you want to transplant it to another place.  The good soil for morning glory is well-draining topsoil. Don’t use clay for this plant.

At least, the seeds of morning glory need 3-7 days to sprout. You have to be patient to wait them. Water the seedlings once a day with a spray in the morning and keep the temperature about 20 – 30˚C. Put the seedlings in the shade place.

            After morning glories sprout, move them to the light place. Even though they love sunlight, you should keep the soil to be moist until the true leaves appear. Avoid your plants from the heavy rain, because the young morning glories are fragile. You can fertilize morning glories when their age is about four weeks. Don’t fertilize them too often, just do it once a month.

            Adult plants need something to climb. Provide trellis for morning glories to climb or you can let them to climb on the fence. Don’t hope they will climb on the wall, because they can’t climb on the flat surface.

            Morning glory takes 4-6 weeks to start blooming. Each flower will bloom every morning and it will close before midday. Sometimes, the colour of the flowers is influenced by air temperature. Therefore, one plant will have different colour gradation for each flower. Morning glory flowers will produce seeds after blooming. They will form pods. You can crop the seeds after the pods are dry and the colour changes to be dark brown.

            Growing flowers from the seeds is very enjoyable. We will get satisfy when we see the flowers has been blooming.