PACIFIC HORTICULTURE, Number 2 April/May/June 2000, PAGES 29-33
THE HIBISCUS REVOLUTION (1st page)
By Charles Black
Charles B1ack's fascination with hibiscus began while he lived in Hawaii, where he had developed skills in the propagation of tropical plants. He began an evaluation program to select cultivars offering the best flowers and the sturdiest growth habit. He then pefected a unique hibiscus grafting method that improves plant performance and simplifies their production. His Hidden Valley Hibiscus, Inc, is now the largest producer of exotic hibiscus, shipping over 50,000 plants to commercial growers for distribution throughout the United States and beyond. He shares with us the recent history of hibiscus, the problems accociated with many available cultivars and his recommendations for the best of the best.
Hibiscus rosa-sinensis commonly called Chinese or tropical hibiscus, has the distinction of being a "manmade" plant. Although the genus Hibiscus includes hundreds of species found in tropical and temperate climates, most bear little or no resemblance to cultivated forms of H. rosa-sinensis, the most popular plant in the genus. The flowering plants we admire and grow today are the result of hybridization efforts by many people over the course of several centuries and in widely disparate geographical areas. Within just the last decade, new and exciting breeding work has begun transform these lanky landscape plants into sturdy, compact, garden scrubs with sensational blooms.
In spite of the specific epitet, sinensis (meaning Chinese), most speculation now centers on India as the likely source of the earliest ancestors of today's hybrid hibiscus. Hibiscus rosa-sinensis has not been found in the wild, but almost certainly originated somewhere on the Asian contient. One researcher, Ross Gast (see Fall '89, p 47) sailed around the world in the early 1960s in an attempt to trace the origins of hibiscus. He believed that people leaving, the Indian subcontinent and migrating through the South Pacific islands were the first to spread H. rosa-sinensis to other parts of the world. Nonetheless, it was in China that hibiscus were first cultivated extensively; many selections were discovered growing around temples and palaces there by European eplorers and traders who brought hibiscus back to Europe. One of the oldest descriptions and
Picture text: A medley of the best hibiscus. Author's photo.
