New varieties for 2000 (Britain) Graham's picks of the Year Ageratum 'Blue Mist' Antirrhinum 'Cinnamon Bronze' Begonia 'Nonstop Rose Petticoat' Eschscholtzia (California poppy) 'Golden Tears' Eschscholtzia (California poppy) 'Champagne & Roses' Impatiens 'Accent Violet Star' Pansy 'Chalon Improved' Petunia 'Double Cascade Burgundy Plum Vein' Petunia 'Pink Lady' Salpiglossis 'Orange Bicolour Royale' Salvia 'Sizzler Orange' Viola (Mini-pansy) 'Molly's Sister' Viola 'Starbeam' Antirrhinum 'Bells Purple & White' The Bells Series of dwarf antirrhinums is one of the most prolific of all and withits open-throated flowers always keeps flowering a little longer than traditional snapdragons. This new release from the seven colour series has flared flowers are purple with a white tube behind making it a cut above the usual snapdragon. Bohemian Rhapsody This amazing mixture contains over 100 different varieties carefully chosen to be well matched in height, about 12in/30cm, and to flower in a constant succession from about May to September &endash; and all from the same sowing in the garden. Colourful and fascinating &endash; the most colour for the least possible work. (Suttons) Calendula Kablouna Gold & Orange These wonderful English marigolds are great cut flowers and light up the border too. Simply sow them where you want them to flower and they'll produce months of big gold or orange daisies, each with a rounded crest in the centre. (Suttons) Campanula 'Isabella' A completely new pot and bedding plant needing a warm sheltered site outsoide and also ideal as a windowsill pot plant. It's neat in growth, prolific, and flowers continuously and daintily all summer. Coreopsis maritima I remember this plant from years ago when I worked at Kew but I've never seen it in a catalogue before. It grows wild on remote California beaches so in gardens it takes dry summers in its stride and its bright yellow daisies sparkle in the sun over its fresh, slightly succulent foliage. It's a good cut flower too. (Mr Fothergill) Geranium Unwins Simply Red Geranium seed can be ridiculously expensive, you can still pay almost a £1 a seed for some varieties. But Unwins Simply Red is a prolific classic scarlet geranium for tubs and window boxes but at a great price: 20 seeds for just £2.99. And come next May the garden centres will be charging that much for a single plant. (Unwins) Impatiens 'Cherry Butterfly' and 'Peach Butterfly' These two new impatiens both have unique markings. They're good in containers, but while the markings on some patterned impatiens are too subtle for borders these two newcomers with their bold V-shaped flashes really stand out well from a distance. They're prolific, take sun or shade and in particular 'Cherry Butterfly', blushed white with a bold cherry V, really lights up a shady corner. (Unwins) Poppy Seriously Scarlet It's serious all right. A sumptuous annual poppy to sow direct into the garden, its enormous frilly double flowers in a brilliant rich red have a dark smoky purple-blue centre and are set off by silky glaucous leaves. And it's very easy to grow. (Thompson & Morgan) Sunflower Vincent's Mixture Sunflowers are all the rage and every year more colours appear, more with double flowers, even some without pollen so when you cut them they don't stain the furniture. I was really impressed when I saw this mixture &endash; the range of colours and flower forms is enormous and it contains many varieties that are so new you can't buy them individually. A real spectacle. (Unwins) Sweet pea Celebration Collection This year Mr Fothergill's Seeds have come up with a neat way to celebrate the millennium. They've put together a range of collections of varieties with a 'red, white and blue' colour theme. This sweet pea collection is my favourite but there's also pansies, verbenas and traditional bedding collection. (Mr Fothergill) Pansy 'Sweet Charity' A blend of just three new state-of-the-art winter-and-spring flowering varieties in primrose yellow, black and mahogany red &endash; it sounds an unlikely combination but it works wonderfully well. What's more, 10p from the sale of every packet goes to the Greenfingers appeal. (Suttons Seeds) Pansy 'Lemon Violets' is a new colour in the the Fleuroselect award winning Velour Series and also known as 'Velour Purple Wings'. This caught everyone's eye in the 1998/99 Royal Horticultural Society trial, with its dramatic combination of purple upper petals and lemony white lower petals. It's especially compact so is ideal in a window box &endash; it allows you to still see out of the window. (Suttons, T&M,) Verbena 'Serenity' is recommended for baskets but to me it's just as good as ground cover in the border. It features the widest range of colours yet amongst the cut-leaved verbenas, from deep purple through lilacs and a pretty pink to white. And it's rarely spoiled by mildew. (Suttons)   Full A-Z listing of new flowers for 2000 Reviews of new flower seed catalogues for 2000 ©copyright 1999 Graham Rice. All Rights Reserved. All Images Digitally Watermarked.