Resina Calendula

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This selection was bred for consistently high resin content on the flower buds and leaves, for making salves and tinctures, poulticing, and other medicinal use. Calendula is treasured as a soothing and disinfecting herb for cuts, scrapes, rashes, and other skin problems. Also used as a lymph stimulant to remove toxins and promote healing. Flowers are harvested and dried at the height of bloom.


Sunny flowers in yellow, gold, and occasionally orange bloom over a long season--all year in mild climates. (The name "calendula" refers to the fact that they can bloom in every month in the calendar in climates where the ground doesn't freeze.) Easy and useful edible flower on salads and cakes, or instead of saffron in cooked dishes--just the loose petals are eaten. 50 seeds

Calendulas are easy-to-grow flowers that can be direct-sown in the garden. But they do have some special quirks you need to know. They have germination inhibitors--compounds on the seed surface that prevent it from sprouting until there is plenty of water available. You need to either wash off the inhibitors, or keep the soil very moist after planting. They will bloom and handle direct sun all summer, but the seeds will not sprout in hot soil, so plant in the spring before the soil warms up too much. Or, if planting in hot weather, put them in pots in a cool moist shady spot until the plants are up and going. Also, the seeds need dark. Many seeds won't germinate unless they get enough light to tell them the soil surface is near. But calendulas are big seeds with the oomph to make it to the surface from 1/2" to 1" deep, which is where they want to be. That's it--Just sow the seeds in cool soil, at a good depth, and you should have lots of lots of sunny blooms over a very long period.