Hidden Valley Hibiscus Forum

I didn't really know where to put this, but I think that it will work here, im going to say this is the miscellaneous section:P   I was just curious how everyone got into growing hibiscus.  What was that one plant or moment that started it all?

For me it was a grocery store potted variety, mandarin wind and my first exotic was actually Rainbow Sherbet, I guess getting a good one really started it all.  I found the colors of all these exotics fascinating and the fact that weather influenced pigment expression and the diversity of offspring from crosses really served to fuel my interest further.  This eventually lead me to collect the 20 cvs I have now, in hopes of hybridizing new varieties.  That will have to wait for the time being, due to space restrictions, but I can still build my collection :P

Charlie, I was especially curious as to how it all started for you.  Were you always into horticulture or was this a hobby that became a business?

Anyways I look forward to hearing from all of you.

-Chris

I had a couple garden variety hibs and wasn't particularly interested in them.  They, along with a couple of my other plants, developed a bad aphid infestation.  I didn't know what the aphids were so I looked up "hibiscus pests" or something along those lines.  I actually ended up at HVH's website and started looking at cv photos.  I was in awe at Voodoo Magic... haha... amongst others.  Anyway, I ended up ordering a Voodoo and was hooked from there.

Good thread, Chris! The Mandarin series and others from Yoder Brothers were some of my first, too.

I followed my father into his business after college, but my heart wasn't in it. Good money for a 20 something but I lived for my hobbies and time off. When I turned 40 I decided to change, and so got into horticulture. First I worked for someone else learning propagation and then started my own company. It was obvious from the beginning that the established nurseries had the well known plants tied up, like roses and geraniums and so forth. No way to compete with them but the specialist market was and still is open to new plant and ideas. I tried a lot of different species and sold a lot of interesting and odd plants until I discovered the hibiscus hybrids that were barely a blip on the market. During that time I also worked with the old-fashioned type hibiscus like the Mandarin series.

I ordered my first exotic type hibiscus from a rare plant catalog and it arrived as a tiny rooted cutting named 'Donna Lynn'. I forgot all about it until some months later when it bloomed for the first time. At 8 inches and with multiple colors it was the most amazing hibiscus bloom I had ever seen. I knew right away that if there were other varieties similar to this one there would definitely be a market for them. Number 1 rule before growing anything for sale - make sure there is a market.

I grew a bunch of 'Donna Lynn' plants while beginning the search for more varieties. That led me to the newly formed hibiscus mail list on the internet which I joined. I also found out about a guy up in Pasadena (part of Los Angeles) who had collected over 400 varieties by visiting the tiny specialist nurseries in Florida and bringing them back. He was more than willing to let me take cuttings of his plants, so I was off and running. I also wrote to Larry Johnson, a commercial hibiscus grower in Florida then but now retired, and asked him if he would sell me some cuttings. I did not hear anything for some weeks, and then out of the blue a big box full of cuttings arrived, no charge. Larry was like that, being a retired fireman who loved hibiscus he would share wood with anyone. Anyway, between Larry and the guy in Pasadena I started building a collection that would soon number over 1000 varieties. I met hybridizers Dale Dubin and Barry Schlueter online and both of them sent me dozens of their varieties plus other show winner types.

All that happened within a year, but it was the following year that enamored me forever with hibiscus. That was the year that all those new varieties that I received as cuttings bloomed for the first time. Every day I would wake up and be greeted with several new flowers that I had never seen before plus new blooms of ones already seen. It was quite a feast for the eyes! And really exciting for me.

Then John Bagnasco, who was a VP of Armstrong Garden Centers, heard what I was doing and tracked me down. At our meeting he told me that he had been interested in the new hibiscus for several years but had no source for them. He offered to buy all that I could grow and so HVH was off and running. That was the beginning of more work but more fun than I had ever had and still continues to be both.

Charlie

For me it started when I was 16 years old ( around that time??) I was into photography and my dad bought me a camera for Christmas. I have loved animals since I was 10, so whats a girl to do with a camera ? of course take pictures of animals lol. I would take pictures of my dogs , and wanted to take pictures of wild birds in my area. Before this interested happened I have saved a hummingbird, I found the poor little guy on the floor in someone's driveway while I was walking my dog. I like most animals But hate most birds ( I only like a few types usually the ones you can't have for pets ) hummingbirds are probably one of my favorites and while I was learning to take pictures I saw many websites with nice pictures of hummingbirds. I wanted to take similar pictures of hummingbirds. I had no garden at the time so I searched the net for what plants attract hummers.  I looked at the list of plants hummers liked and when to my local nursery and started to buy seeds. I bought morning glories ( which where all ready my favorite flower back then) , Zennia, columbine ( which never grew for me ), delphinium , and lupine. I then saw you could not buy Fuchsias as seeds so I went and bought a few types from home depot and local nursery.  I bought bird feeders and hummer feeders also.

After I got all of the stuff and my garden was growing I had many hummers come to my garden ! I was so happy and pleased , I would just sit out there and wait for hours to see these little guys. I did not have my camera with me most of the time because I wanted the hummers to get used to me first. As I watched the hummers I noticed they only likes a few flowers ( fuchsia, zennia, lupine) the rest of the flowers where pretty much ignored. I witness a hummers getting nectar from my morning glories ONLY ONE TIME lol.  So I went on the net again and looked at more info on hummers. I saw a plant called hibiscus and did not know what there at the time by name ( I had neighbors with them they where just flowers to me  :D) I then saw pictures and said OOO they like Hawaiian flowers :P  So I searched the net for hibiscus and found a website called http://www.trop-hibiscus.com/  When I saw all of the pictures I fell in love !

I then searched exotic hibiscus and found Charlies website ! I was going crazy looking at all the beautiful flowers. I was 16 and had no money or bank account. I showed my mother and she was like OMG they are so pretty. I read like every page on Charlies website and saw that his plants where sold through Armstrong nursery ! My mom and I went to so many Armstrong nurseries looking for these hibiscus and finally found some!  I think the first cv we bought was the path and Jazz.  Every week we would go looking for more and I ended up with lookithat  , christmas frost , lavender ice , amethyst heart,  and two more I can't remember right now.

I also then inherited my grandmother roses , she had striped and different types of roses ! we would buy her new cv's when we found out roses came in cv's ( before the hibiscus stuff happened)  So I had roses , hibiscus , zennia, fuchsias, and morning glories. After all of this hibiscus crazy I went through can you believe only one hummer took interested in jazz lol. I soon found out that hummers see in UV vision or near UV vision. Most of the hibiscus cv's where not red or hot pink jazz has a nice hot pink ring around the center. All the other species of flowers I had where hot pinks, fuchsia , reds, hot orange colors my morning glories where light pale blue

I kind of slowed down on buying more hibiscus because winter was coming and I was running out of room. I  tried taking pictures of the hummers but these guys are super nosy ! They would look at my camera and looked at it like " what is that thing "  Every time they would do this so I had to sit out there with camera until they got used to it ( which was not really working lol)
After all of this work getting hummers to my garden this is the only picture I got

(http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k72/kalibobs/scan0013.jpg)

I still laugh till this day that this was the only picture I could get !

I then moved into apt and had to give my plants away  :( I bought gator pride , and monsteratt a few years later after we have been living in this apt now they both died because I bought them in  the fall and the there was no light on the balcony then. I assumed that no light hits are balcony for years until I noticed it only hits balcony in spring to the end of fall. And this is why I have a new collection now ! I have to buy t5's soon to keep them alive in the winter !

But back to the hummers as I am typing this one just came to visit my flowers ( wild dream bloomed ) .  Since everything is blooming I have a hummer visit everyday I don't know what species but it looks like a male cantaloupe hummer. I hear him at 6 am looking for flowers then he comes back when the sun is about to go down. I doubt I could get a picture of him I scare him a few times on accident. I heard him one time and I opened my curtains and he got surprised and another time I opened my sliding door and he just stared at me like what are you doing lol


PS sorry for the long story !

I just looked at a hummer website and I said cantaloupe lol I meant calliope. I used to call the cantaloupe hahaha  but it looks like my visitor is a Allen's hummer.

Nice story guys, really interesting how everyone started off! 

Charlie it is pretty interesting how that one plant really started it all for you.  Do you still have that original Donna Lynn?

Kerry I really liked your story, it sounds alot like my childhood, but mine was more fish obsessed :)  You mentioned that Wild dream bloomed... so where is the pic! :P

Yes, I enjoyed hearing how people started, too. Kerry, I've had hummers sipping nectar from my hibiscus for years now but also only managed one photo, compliments of that particular hummingbird. One of the problems was that all the digital cameras I had before now had a terrible lag time when taking a pic which did not work for hummingbirds. The one photo I did get was because I had composed a shot of a pot of hibiscus and was all ready to take the photo when the hummingbird darted right into the middle of the shot and then hovered for enough seconds that i could press the shutter release and get the shot! My new camera has little to no lag and a pretty good long lens so maybe I can get some more shots in the future.

Chris, I grew a lot of Donna Lynns in the early years but I don't have it anymore. Beautiful flower but the bush was a low growing sprawler that wasn't very good for garden center sales.


Charlie

Nice pictures,  I have been noticing more hummers in the yard ever since I planted this hibs in the ground. 

Thats too bad about Donna Lynn, but it looks like Bubble gum fun is a better version of it?

Hummingbirds like my hibs as well... it drives my cats crazy!!  One of the kitties is allowed on the porch, and she almost caught one of the little guys once!  I didn't see him again for awhile.

HOW CUTE Charlie

Well I was working with film and film was expensive !!!!!

I think I am going to buy a shutter release so I can try to get some of my new friend.

My hibiscus addiction began in Washington State where I lived in the Cascade Mountains. I already had a jungle of houseplants in my house - some over 10 feet tall. I had lived in the mountains for so many years that I had almost given up on trying to grow things outside. So I had a huge houseplant collection.

Someone gave me my first hibiscus. It was a garden variety pink with small plain flowers. But it bloomed constantly and loved my hottest, sunniest west window that few of my other houseplants could tolerate. I was hooked!

That little hibiscus and my giant houseplant collection actually played a part in Charlie and me getting together.... not too hard to imagine, I suppose. Two plant lovers meeting on the internet.... and so the story goes....   ;)

 Cindy that is too funny this is how I met my boy friend two reef aquarium lovers on the internet and so our story goes  :D

Looks like these forums are better than eharmony :P

LOL Charlie and I actually met on a medical forum for a specific medical concern we both have in our families. It was a pretty intense forum, exploring the newest research, with lots of science and digging for info. We found ourselves wanting to go farther into the research than the other people on the forum, in our typical nutty way. Then we discovered a common interest in plants, and several other things.... as the story goes.....  ::)

I do think that you can find someone that you have a lot in common with on the internet - often more easily than the random people you meet in your face-to-face life. Highly focused forums on specific topics seem to work well to unite people who share the same level of interest in the topic, I guess.  It's pretty intoxicating to find someone else who loves what you love at the same level as you. Then if they are crazy about LOTS of the same things you are into, true love could be in the air.....  ;D  It was for us!

Cindy

I know I think specific forums are great way to meet people. Its amazing ! I still tell my boy friend I can't believe we like the same things lol

I know this is an old thread, but I loved reading everyone's stories :)

Charlie, it is amazing how life sometimes takes completely unexpected turns. You are a lucky man, being surrounded by these beautiful flowers every day...what a dream!

I first noticed that there was such a thing as tropical hibiscus when I dropped my daughter off at her friend's house. Right by the front door was this huge bush with huge brownish flowers. I was stunned, all I had ever seen before were the ubiquitous garden varieties. So on the way back to my car I bent down and peeked at the plant label...hiddenvalleyhibiscus.com. As soon as I got home I went on the computer and checked out the website. WOW!!! Of course I placed my first order right away. And while I may not have as many varieties as I would like, I'm completely hooked. There's just nothing more relaxing than looking at perflect flowers after a stressful day.

On a side note, I love to photograph hummingbirds in flight too and have been quite successful. You can check out my pics here: http://UBSeng.zenfolio.com/p1063603244 (http://UBSeng.zenfolio.com/p1063603244). Strangely enough, there's only one with a hibiscus, and it's my neighbor's plant  ::)

Uli, your photos are wonderful! I photographed a hummingbird with hibiscus only once and it was pure luck. Thanks for sharing these, and the story of your discovery of exotic hibiscus.

Charlie

Uli,

Those pics are awesome!  What shutter speed do you use to get the humming birds so that their wings aren't blurry?

Thanks Charlie and Chris. For hummers I use what I call my "4x4" settings: Canon 40D, 400mm lens, ISO 400, 1/400sec, (f5/6). Light high-sync fill flash and light shade does the trick.

Uli those are great pics , your lucky to get the pictures I had bad luck hence my story lol

I will try again this summer at my aunt's house. I don't have a good lens for regular shooting , I just have my 105mm macro lens  :P

Great topic!   I have loved hibiscus forever.  I called them the "hula" flower.  I have had the plain red garden variety since I can remember in my early teens.  I got serious about photography in high school, and took up macro photography with flowers. 

I got married this July and my mother wanted us to have this personalized signature plate for all the gusts to sign.  The woman would paint flowers on the border along with your names and dates.  I asked her if she could do hibiscus instead of the flowers she usually painted.  She didn't know what they were so I said I would find a photo online for her and email it.  Upon doing this search, I came across one of those photo-shopped crazy looking hibiscus with blue, pink, yellow, purple, orange.....  You know the ones...  Well, my mouth fell open.  Hibiscus only came in red, yellow, and pink?  Right??  Well I started to browse the web and came across HVH.  I read every single page on their site.  I feel bad because we had company and I couldn't get away from the computer.  I was sucked in for life!!

I emailed a photo to the lady and continued to read HVH.  I placed an order for Bonnie Lass & Sleeping Beauty.   The BL & SB were not available so Cindy called me and asked what I would like instead.  I told her Cindy's Heart, Saffron, & Belle du Jour.  She searched the yard and found them and found one of each.  In the meantime, I went to a local tropical nursary (Logee's) which I just found out about this spring as well.  And there I bought a small Cajun Blue.  I also got so anxious and found another site and bought Voodoo Magic, City Slicker, & Gabriel. 

Over the summer my hibiscus collection grew and grew and I now have somewhere around 20.  Luckily they are all small still.  I even have had some seed pods of my own give me some seeds!

As for photography, I saw Uli's hummer photos and thought I would give it a try.  One day I came home around lunch time and found a hummer at my red hibiscus.  I grabbed my camera and started shooting.  Here is a couple of what I got!

Kristen, I love your hummingbird photos. Between you and Uli we may have enough good photos to set up a web page called "Hibiscus and Hummers". I have one photo to contribute to it, which was pure luck due to the long lag time that older digital cameras had after clicking the shutter button.

These stories about getting involved with hibiscus are so fun to hear. It always comes down to being captivated by the sheer beauty of the flowers plus enjoying the pleasures and pains of growing something. Thanks for sharing your story.

Charlie

It all started for me back in 1977. I remember stumbling across 3 Albo Lacinatus trained as standards in 5 gallon pots. I bought all 3 and planted them in the pots in the ground mainly to keep them from blowing over. They soon just exploded with growth and blooms. It was normal to have 100 blooms per day between the 3. I was hooked. In winter I would just dig them up and cut them back hard. I had them for many years. One year it got extremely cold down to 10 degrees. The little heater I had in my 12x12 greenhouse didn't keep it warm enough and I lost everything.
I grew most of the common garden varieties:
Brilliant
Seminole
Painted Lady
Crown of Bohemia

I'm not sure when I first came across some exotic hibiscus. Some of the popular ones here in Houston were:
Pink Parasol
The Path
Norman Lear
Creole Flame

Whenever I visited a nursery I would check for a variety I didn't have. It truly becomes an addiction.

Doll, you beat me to hibiscus by quite a few years. I was even living in Houston during the late 70's  but never saw any exotic hibiscus back then. I did grow The Path, Norman Lee, and Creole Flame some years later. The Path is the foundation variety for a number of our most popular hybrids.

Speaking of The Path, I was contacted several years ago by a man who told me he was the hybridizer of The Path and was very pleased that we were distributing so many of them through Zoes Tropicals in Florida. He told me of his struggles to raise a very large family and still find time for growing and hybridizing hibiscus. That's one of the interesting aspects of hybrid or exotic hibiscus - they were created by the efforts of hundreds of back yard grower/hybridizers over the last hundred years or so. A true labor of love.

Charlie

You don't by any chance have any Creole Flame.

Hi all,

I'm new here but this thread looks like a good place to start.

I've known hibiscus ever since I was a toddler, living on a town not far from equator line here in Indonesia.  At the house we were living, there is this huge Hibiscus tree as tall as the house (or as I remember it) with red mini flower that blooms all the time.  I didn't remember again about hibiscus but somehow as I grow up, I have always wanted a purple hibiscus.  I guess I've seen it somewhere and make a mental note about.

I was replanting my yard  a year ago and when the gardener asked what kind of plant that I want to have, I automatically ask for a purple hibiscus.  One thing led to another and I now have 6 different CV on my yard, and now I am really considering to change the concept of my yard from an Orangery (herbs varieties) to a Hibiscus Haven, we'll see in a couple years how it turned out.  I came to know HVH because my purple hibiscus is having problem blooming and I've got the answer here (thrips).  I was shocked to see how beautiful Exotic hibiscus here and somehow become even more hibiscus crazy.

One thing about living on tropical climate all the time, you tends to ignore the obvious flowering plant that is well suited here.  The Hibiscus here so common that people no longer considers it as a special plant that deserve a place in the garden.  Planting a Aglaonema or Anthurium is more hip than a Hibiscus (as my friend mentioned once: a goat's food).  All of my CV's are considered ancestors varieties only with different coloring.  So common that nobody bothered to hybridize it here, it's even hard to find it in nurseries here.  But hey, I love it!

I'll be looking for more guidance from this forum and thank you Cindy & Charles for starting this web that connects many of Hibiscus Lover a place to talk to one another.

To determine where and how this all started for me I had to think about this for a bit because it goes way back into my childhood.   When I was child every year we had a vegetable garden during our short summer in Ohio.  When I wasn't playing baseball I was playing in the garden.  Every spring I would help my Father rototill the garden, plant and take care of it until the crop was ready to harvest.
When I was 13 my 1st job was at the local fruit stand picking tomatoes, vegies, and pumpkins in the fields.   It was a fun job that paid under the table and I also learned how to grow fruits and vegies from the Farmers.
After my 1st year in high school, my Father accepted a promotion in which we packed up and moved to North Palm Beach in SE FL.   Every since I could remember my Mother had a gardenia tree that she kept in a 5 gallon pot when we lived in Ohio.   During the summer she would set it outside and it would bloom with these wonderful smelling flowers.   During the winter she brought it inside the porch where it would go dormant until the next summer.   Over the years the gardenia declined and we saw less and less blooms over the summers.   
By the time we moved to FL.  the same gardenia in the 5 gallon pot was practically a dead tree.
For some reason my Mom brought the gardenia down to FL when we moved.   One of the 1st things we did plant wise in FL was we transplanted the gardenia out of the pot and into the ground facing South just outside our lanai pool area.    In 1 years time, the same gardenia that did poorly in Ohio went absolutely crazy down in FL. and it grew very big as it was constantly blooming next to the jasmine we planted.   
When we moved to FL I was fascinated with the plant life and how well things grew in FL.    I fell in love with palm trees as I learned about many different types of palms including my favorites the Royal Palm and the Canary Palm.
When we dug the hole in FL for the gardenia we realized that below the crab grass is nothing but sand in the ground.  In FL there in no soil/dirt, the only thing in the ground was  light grey sand and fossilized sea life.   Everything in our yard in FL was planted directly into the sand and it did very well for us.   In FL the sun makes up many things.   We had hibiscus planted in sandy ground and they bloomed like crazy!  Root rot was never a problem since sand drains well.
In the front of our house, we had 2 hibiscus trees that were planted in the sand.    They were 6-7 feet tall when we moved into the house.   In just a few years those 2 hibiscus trees grew  over 12 feet tall and were taller than the house.    The type of hibiscus trees we had were a light pink garden variety but they bloomed and bloomed and never stopped all year round.
We could not believe how well our hibiscus and perennial's grew into the sandy ground.   They were watered daily from the rain and or sprinkler/drip system but with no fertilizer.  We never fertilized the hibiscus trees but occasionally the landscapers would spray them with magnesium to help green them up.    One day we noticed our hibiscus trees were completely covered in green aphids and I started to learn about pest including mites in FL.    We  sprayed them ourselves with soapy water and it cleared the aphids right up and they were back to blooming with as many as 50 flowers at 1 time.
My time in FL was short but I loved every minute of it working as the head lifeguard at the Jupiter Island Beach Club, teaching swimming lessons, and surfing when ever there were waves (that wasn't often).

Unfortunately my Dad's job changed around again and we had to move back to Ohio.   I was still going to community college living with my parents and had no choice but to move back to Ohio with them.   It has been 15 years since I lived in FL and I miss it so much.   Someday I will move back to FL and grow mad hibiscus.    When we moved back to Ohio it was extremely hard for me to adjust to Ohio's weather, winter, and boring lifestyle.    For some reason the surfing lifestyle stayed with me even when I moved back to Ohio.   To help cope with the depression of leaving FL, I ordered Dean Miller Surf bedding (still have Dean Miller today)  and every summer I would go to a big box store and buy a hibiscus and just enjoy it for the summer.    Ever summer I would get the same red garden variety or sometimes have a 2nd pink one.    Hibiscus remind me of FL very much and it was a way of bringing a little taste of FL back to Ohio.    By about 2010 I was living on my own in Ohio and the 1st thing I did before I moved in my apartment was go to the big box store and buy the same pink and red garden variety hibiscus.    I was getting frustrated because the hibiscus I had were not doing well at all.   I killed a healthy hibiscus just by transplanting it.
Finally one day I was sick and tired of all these yellow leaves/bare sticks on my hibiscus and was searching the internet for some hibiscus fertilizer.     I came across HVH and was thrilled to see an all hibiscus nursery and realized Charlie and Cindy shared all there hard work to the public.   Not only did I find fertilizer but I found all this great information on the care section of the HVH website.    I read the whole HVH website over and over and realized they sold some hibiscus to.   I couldn't believe HVH had blue hibiscus and learned for the 1st time that you can grow hibiscus in the house over the winter and not have to dispose of it when summer was over!    After I received my 1st tub of Special Blend and my 1st blue hybrid that was it, I was hooked.      Today my license plate say HIBISCN.   It's a fun hobby and it keeps me out of trouble when I'm not working.  My brother and I have a plan and there is a point to all of this.   We started enlarging some of my best photos and had the prints put on canvas. The Space Oddity icon next to my name was one of the 20"x20" canvas prints that we had made up for our bathrooms and offices. 
Kyle