Growing and Sharing Cosmos from my Home!
When I moved into this miracle home in 2022, my first home of my own, I threw out some Cosmos seeds in the front yard along the street. They germinated, bloomed, then reseeded themselves, coming back more prolific in 2023.
That summer and autumn, I gathered up seeds and mailed them out with holiday cards to family and friends, students and massage clients. I wanted to share some of this magical growing space with everyone who has supported me financially, socially, and emotionally, both through the pandemic shutdown years, as well as over my yoga teaching and massage career since I started in 2001. The unexpected re-gifting came back to me in emails and text messages of growing Cosmos joy via photos and stories from around the country!
I've now witnessed and cherished four summers of blooming Cosmos, along with so many other wildflowers and plants in this growing botanical oasis that I have been stewarding in my yard. This year, the flowers and their seeds were prolific again, so I'm sharing again! Please share and spread these seeds anywhere that could use some flowery love and life!
May your practices, endeavors, and all that you are stewarding in your life offer you fruit and seeds to share with those around you!
Orange Cosmos flowers with pleated leaves growing above its green multi-lobed, dissected leaves, and a couple unopened flower buds.
Cosmos (orange flowers) and Evening Primrose (yellow flowers) growing along the road where I first planted them in 2022.
Would you like some seeds to spread near you?
Cosmos sulphureus, Family = Asteraceae, native to Mexico
Cosmos sulphureus is a species of flowering plant in the sunflower family, Asteraceae, also known as sulfur cosmos and yellow cosmos. It is native to Mexico, Central America, and northern South America, and naturalized in other parts of North and South America as well as in Europe, Asia, and Australia. (Wiki)
Close up of one orange cosmos flower, with a sea of cosmos flowers behind it
Take a deeper dive
into Cosmos
Where will Cosmos grow:
Pretty much anywhere
Light: Partial Shade to Full Sun
Soil: Well draining, no standing water.
Water: Low frequency once germinated and growing.
How to plant the seeds:
Plant after temps are more consistently 70 degrees and above.
To sow in the ground, loosen up the surface soil first, then place the seeds onto the soil's surface.
To sow in a pot, place seeds directly onto the potting soil.
Cover the seeds with ¼” - ½” of soil.
You might crunch/crumple up some dry leaves to put a light covering over them.
Give them some water GENTLY - don’t drown them so they float up or wash away.
Keep the area damp to moist until the seedlings have their first true leaves with jaggedy edges.
Germination takes between 7 and 21 days at the optimal temperature of 75 degrees Fahrenheit; flowering begins between 50 and 60 days after germination. (Wiki)
Articles to read more:
Here’s the entry on Wikipedia for Cosmos.
Here’s an article from The Old Farmer’s Almanac about Cosmos.
Here’s an article from The Spruce about Cosmos
Primary Wonder - Denise Levertov
Days pass when I forget the mystery.
Problems insoluble and problems offering
their own ignored solutions
jostle for my attention, they crowd its antechamber
along with a host of diversions, my courtiers, wearing
their colored clothes; caps and bells.
And then
once more the quiet mystery
is present to me, the throng's clamor
recedes: the mystery
that there is anything, anything at all,
let alone cosmos, joy, memory, everything,
rather than void: and that, 0 Lord,
Creator, Hallowed one, You still,
hour by hour sustain it.
A bee with veined wings gathering pollen from a cosmos flower
The Cosmos over Lake Mary, CA. Photo taken by Ed Hufschmidt
William Hufschmidt
Decatur, GA, 30032