They are like a bush but die back in the winter. They reseed like crazy. I've have about 50 or more new plants pop up everywhere.
They are great plants if your willing to put up with pulling up new ones the next year.

I'm under the impression that they're related to morning glories, but I could be mistaken. That may be because they're so frequently planted with them. A neat combination I've seen is morning glories (open in morning), 4 o'clocks (afternoon) and moon flower (night). Morning glories also reseed like mad, though aggressive deadheading could prevent that.

If you have kids or pets, don't get moon flower mixed up with datura - the latter is also known as jimson weed, and is a highly toxic hallucinogen. They look very similar. Beautiful flower, very dangerous.

I personally love four o'clocks and morning glories. I don't have any right now, but it's mostly because I haven't had any luck starting the four o'clocks from seed. Is there a trick to that? My only problem with morning glories is cleaning up the mess when they die back in winter. Love the idea of combining the two with moonflowers!

They have an absolutely wonderful scent, and having a large tap root that presumably stores water they can go a long time between waterings. I planted them around the compost bin in the easement behind my fence to hide it from the neighbors. It gets no supplemental water and we had little rain this year and yet it has managed to grow and bloom.

My next door neighbors have it planted around their shady mailbox on the 'ell strip. It always looks fresh and blooms all summer. Sometimes I walk over there just to smell it.

It seems there is a place for every 'bloomin' plant.

Well, they sound pretty good. I guess you'd want to keep them out of your beds and put them where a little spreading won't matter. I wonder if I could find them in a nursery somewhere.

I've just thrown the seeds where I want them to come up and they always do. I just wish you could buy the seeds by color rather than mixed. I like the white ones because they look really good at night when the moon is shining on them. Only problem with the white is in my harden they don't reliably return. The yellow seem the most hardy, followed by the bright pink. I've not tried the fancier ones.

i'm one of the regular complainers about four o'clocks

they were here when we bought the place and covered about 20 percent of our .79 acres-which happened to be the part i wanted to garden in - they reseed like crazy - maybe in another year or two i will have them under control
i think i would like them if i could ever get them under control
they do not need extra water or fertilizer and appear to grow best in sandy soil
they are great for humming birds
just pull up the volunteers immediately when they come up where you don't want them
and they do grow up to 6 ft tall so don't plant them where you need short plants!! most of mine are around 4 feet tall

I have a solution to getting rid of 4 o'clocks. Plant the seeds in a pot. Have a momma cat have 8 kittens. When the the seedlings are up and doing well and the kittens are moving around on their own have the kittens all pile into the pot and sleep on the seedlings. This attempt worked very well for me 2 years in a row. I finally found a new home for the momma cat (she was a stray) and have 3 pots of seedlings this year. And a 2 year old male cat (one of the first 4 o'clock killers) who no longer prefers pots.

Sam

If you plant them in a bed around a tree they do very well and its easy to pull up the seedlings you don't want in the loose dirt. Otherwise mow down what you don't want to keep. This is what my friend did in Louisiana. The ones I have had in a pot for 5 years don't reseed much.

Thanks ya'll. I bought seeds and am going to put them in pots. :)

My mom always had them as a kid. I've had none of the horror stories that we all have read about. Mine come up, die off about september and feed hummers, butterflies and sphinx moths the whole time their here. If you've never seen a sphinx moth you will when you plant 4pm's. Just my .02

Mark