Gaillardia Goblin - Blanket Flower seeds

Gaillardia Goblin is a compact, colourful and floriferous variety, well suited for border and container decoration. Its large flower heads are generally bicolour. Their petals or ligules are red at the base, with fringed tips transitioning from orange to yellow. These Gaillardia seeds can be sown directly in the ground in late spring to flower from the second year. This perennial has a modest lifespan of 3 to 4 years and self-sows naturally.

Gaillardia Goblin is one of the many horticultural hybrids resulting from cross-breeding between Gaillardia aristata, a perennial native to the central Great Plains of North America, and G. pulchella, an almost annual plant native to northern Mexico as well as the south and central United States. Like its two parents and the sunflower, this plant belongs to the large family. This hybrid inherited good hardiness and increased longevity from one parent and extraordinary floribundity, rapid growth and an extremely undemanding nature from its second. Pretty 'Goblin' quickly forms a clump  40 cm (16in) in all directions, covered in flowers from June to September. Its flower heads measure 4 to 6 cm (2in) in diameter and are visited by butterflies and other pollinating insects. Like a variegated target, the head appears to be made up of concentric discs of different colours. The heart of the head is a convex disc, whose colour evolves from the periphery towards the centre, at the same time as the seeds form. The mainly basal foliage consists of narrow, slightly lobed or deeply divided, grey-green and downy leaves. This foliage is generally deciduous, drying up in winter. 

Gaillardias are a little old-fashioned, but along with Coreopsis and other Gauras they are champions of floral abundance with an undemanding nature. Even the wild form Gaillardia aristata proves to be very floriferous. Their only drawback is that they do not tolerate ambient humidity well, even in well-drained soil. In southern gardens, especially in poor soils, this plant is truly useful. It can accompany lavenders, bloody cranesbills or ash-leaved cranesbills, artemisias and small grasses such as Stipa which are equally undemanding and floriferous. Its flowers last very well in bouquets.