Back when I worked at the garden center, people would come in and proclaim, “I hate pansies!” And being in retail and wanting to give good customer service, I would reply with something like, “Well, it would be a boring world if we all liked the same thing,” but secretly I’d wonder how anyone could hate pansies?
A google search of just garden blogs has pretty much led to the same conclusion–garden bloggers, for the most part, unabashedly love pansies.
I will say that when I was working retail I didn’t always have the time to plant them–but I was literally surrounded by them every day so it was okay–I really didn’t need to plant them. I could enjoy them vicariously.
Now that I’m not working in the garden trade and I just write about it, I do have to have pansies at the end of every winter. It was a ridiculously easy winter here in Connecticut and we’re probably one of only about 4 states that can say that this year. And despite the fact that I have plenty of spring bulbs coming up, and lovely spring flowering trees, and early blooming shrubs, I have to tuck a few pansies in among the bulbs. It just isn’t spring until I do!
Given my druthers (whatever the heck those are!) I’d plant the smaller flowered violas and the type known as Johnny-Jump-Ups. For those of you who have read my “about” tab, you’ll know that my earliest gardening memory dates back to Johnny-Jump-Ups.
But my husband prefers the larger, splashier varieties, and after all, gardening isn’t always just about ego gratification, is it? If, by planting the larger pansies I can make him happy too, then we both win.
And maybe, I’ll just find a spot to tuck some violas in somewhere just for me.
Gardendaze 