Garden Dud: Zinnia ‘Queen Red Lime’

I wanted to love Zinnia ‘Queen Red Lime’, but it turned out to be the worst performer in my garden in 2009. Its description was promising—maroon flowers with an eye-catching lime green center. I sprouted them from seed indoors and planted them outside in quite a few places in my yard. My mom, who lives 30 miles away, also planted some in her garden. Neither one of us was impressed with the results.

The flowers that sprouted were homely. They were either pink with a sickly, brownish-gray tint…

…or faded-out green with a slight suggestion of pink in the petals:

The two photographs above represent the best-looking flowers in the bunch. The color of many of the other blooms could only be described as “gray.”

Later in the summer the plant produced mostly dark-pink blooms, but they were very small and still had that unappetizing brown tint. I grew them in partial sun and my mom grew them in full sun and we got the same results.

Perhaps I just got a bad batch of seed, but until I see them bloom true-to-description in a botanical garden or someone else’s backyard, I’m going to take a pass on ‘Queen Red Lime’ Zinnia.