Sure Violetta. Let me preface everything to say that I had some serious aphid infestations on many of the seedlings and a few of my established plants within the past few weeks. Some were affected more than others and some were not affected at all which was quite strange since they were all sitting in the same general vicinity. I had to cut Mme. Julia Correvon and PPE back all the way even after treating them with the Neem oil based fungicide/insecticide since the infestation was so severe and Sputnik was also affected but not as much.

The fuscas were totally unaffected at all. They were just separated yesterday and potted up. I was a little mystified about them since they had just sat there for quite a while not putting out any top growth, but when I repotted them, you should have seen the length of the roots on them. I guess they were in vegetative root development mode.

Quite a few of my many blue clematis stans seedlings were unaffected as well and were also just divided yesterday, but I did lose one of my pink clematis stans plants and the other is very anemic looking so I am babying it.

I had three other clematis out of a group of seeds from some early climber mix seeds. They were affected but are recovering. I am afraid however that they look to be either serratifolia or tangutica plants and I don't like those varieties at all. They were transplanted yesterday and I managed to snap the top growth off of one of them but I went ahead and repotted it to see if it would come back from its miniature crown. Time will tell. I also have two others from that group of seeds that are up but still too small to separate.

Another plant, an integrifolia I believe, got large enough that I had transplanted it to a one gallon pot and just today potted it up in a very large pot along with a clematis japonica.

The two heraclefolias that came up very early have gotten quite large and have been in gallon pots for a while. They were severely infested with aphids but they are recovering nicely and shouldn't have an issue doing so due to their size.

I have had a couple of other germinations-one from my texensis bag and one from my pot labeled lisiandra. Not sure if it will be a lisiandra or not since my integrifolia came out of that same pot. I tend to recycle my vermiculite and I think that is how an integrifolia seedling came out of that pot.

Yesterday I decided I had way too many baggies of seeds still waiting for germinations so I screened through them all and combined all the ungerminated seeds in one baggie so I didn't have so many to contend with. While doing so, I came across several glaucophylla seedlings and one viorna seedling (seeds with just roots showing) which were potted up and I will await to see if they will ever show any top growth. I have had some other type III clematis germinate with roots and potted them up but they never did show any top growth so I dug them up and saw that the roots had shriveled up.

The Lisboa seedling experienced some top die back before the aphid infestation so it was trimmed back. Then the aphids hit and it was touch and go. The plant still has foliage down low and I was able to tap some soil away from the top portion and the roots still look healthy. Time will tell with it.

Once it gets hot here, I am going to have trouble finding a place to try and keep them where they won't cook. Same goes for the ten or so pots of plants that I am still waiting on germinations from that are in the garage.

Have also been trying some cuttings of four different clematis using akadama, an expanded clay material that is used in bonsai culture. Mary Rose is one of the clematis I am playing around with propagating since she is supposedly one difficult plant to get and to get rooted.

Will try to get some pictures and post them later.

Okay, here are some quick shots. First the lisiandra or at least the latest seedling out of the lisiandra pot on the left and a mini texensis seedling that might have gotten a touch of too much sun today.

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The seedling originally thought to be a lisiandra seedling but is definitely not and most likely an integrifolia.

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The tub containing the bulk of the seedlings to date, most of which were just transplanted into new pots yesterday and are still recuperating before I move them back outside. You can see the anemic looking little pink clematis stans seedling on the far right. I had a ton of germinations of the blue clematis stans seedlings and put three to a pot since if some don't make it, then at least there will be one seedling in each pot. What I am going to do with all of them if they do make it I haven't a clue.

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The two heracleifolias that germinated last November. I wouldn't be surprised if they don't bloom this fall. I will probably plant one and give one to my mom or sister.

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Amazing! I love growing babies of all my other plants but don't have the nerve (or space) to try it with my clems, so I'm living vicariously through you. Thanks for sharing!

Are aphids regularly a problem you have? I had an infestation going on about a month ago and had been spraying with soapy water and picking them off as much as I could. When I noticed some larvae I had an entomologist friend take a look before I did anything, just in case the larvae wasn't from the aphids. Good thing I did... the larvae was from a kind of fly (Predacious Hoverflies... which I'd never heard of) that eats aphids! And now everything is okay again. :0)

I'm thinking of trying to plant a few things in my flower boxes that attract aphid enemies, just to try to keep the little buggers in check...

No problem Violetta. Growing them from seed has been both fun and frustrating at the same time. I have learned a few things that I will do differently when I try more seeds this year.

Aphids are generally more of a problem for us here in my area in the fall. The plants have suffered through the heat and humidity and as the temps moderate and the plants put out new foliage, the aphids normally attack then. This spring has been more of a spring for us than any in the past few years with warm days, cool nights, and a fair amount of rainfall. That may explain the early attack of the aphids this year. I have been seeing the larva of lady bugs on several of my clematis the past few days so at least now the normal predators are out and can assist in keeping the aphid population in control.

Wonderful! It's so lovely to see lady bugs swarming over all those nasty little aphids, isn't it?