Hi everyone - hope you are all enjoying your gardens! Thank God it is that time again - a little piece of sanity in an increasingly insane world!! Anyway - I have been watching my flower garden and almost everything is coming up with the exception of my verbascum and my hollyhocks. The hollyhocks were from a company that sold me a lot of crap, so I wouldn't be surprised at all if they died over the winter, but the verbascum I bought from a very reputable company - I have 14 of them and not one is doing anything. I called the company and verified that they were perennial and good for my zone (5) and they said they were. She said to give it a little while longer. In the meantime, just wondering if any of you have had experience with them. We have had a few warm days, but much of spring has been relatively mild or cool. I was worried about my hibiscus too, but just noticed teeny little buds coming up from the base of one of them a few days ago. What do you guys think?

Did your hollyhocks flower last year? I'm pretty sure they're a biennial so if they flowered, they're probably done. Don't quote me on that though!

My hollyhocks are a foot tall. They self seed and come back every year in about the same place and a few others. If yours don't make it, I probably still have some seeds left. Pink ones and cream ones.

I thought with biennials, that even though they flowered only every other year, that the foliage would still be there every year. Like last year I planted foxglove, but got no flowers - this year, they are about to flower. Not sure - but I thought through deadheading you could bet a biennial to act perennial in nature?

Depending on variety, Hollyhocks can be annual, biennial or perennial. There are all types. (Althaea rosea), herbaceous plant of the hibiscus, or mallow, family (Malvaceae), native to China.

The biennial hollyhock would be one of the first plants to green up in spring. Sounds like yours are goners.

This spring has been a bit colder than average (around here the average temperature has been 4 to 5 degrees below the average over years) and that may have slowed some things. My Catalpa, Black Walnut, and another of the slower to leaf out trees I cannot think of right now, are just starting to bud and the Oaks have been really slow to leaf out. However, the Hollyhocks are up and growing here and some already have blossom buds showing.
If there are no signs that either of these are coming up in yor garden by now I would suspect a problem.