'Miss Congeniality'

Miss Congeniality is one that I hybridized back in 2005 but it languished in a 1 gallon pot for several years during which time I did not see any blooms that surely must have opened. Then in 2008 I did see it bloom and liked the blooms. I doubted very much that the gnarly old wood would root but to my delight it did root quite readily. The bigger surprise was that the cloned plants grew much more beautifully than the forgotten seedling ever had, very nice bushes in fact, and that flowers were larger than the one I saw on the seedling and as you noted there are lots of them. It is very rare for an old seedling to eventually come good but is why I am reluctant to toss them out before they are evaluated sufficiently.

The other down side was that the cross info tag had long faded into oblivion. My best guess would be that it is the offspring of 5th Dimension, Rainbow Christie or Midnight Blue or any combination of these with something else based on what I was using the most at that time. This is just a guess though, and not worth much. I now take the time to make non-fading loop tags like the ones that come on HVH plants for each individual seedling. Only half way through this big job for this year but I won't pot them into the final 2 gallon pot until they have the info securely on them.

Charlie