Hidden Valley Hibiscus Forum

I'm very please with the way Island Girl is performing in our yard. It's one of the prettiest flowers we grow, with the many colors all blended together in ever changing ways. We'd call it a blue, and one parent is Renaissance Blue, but it also shows the red hues it inherited from its' other famous parent, Dragon's Breath. The bush tends to be compact and very floriferous - a fancy word meaning it blooms a lot! The flowers are presented mostly upwards, sometimes sideways, but never downward and in our conditions are almost always 6 or 7 inches across. What's your experience with Island Girl?

Always dreamin' hibiscus,

Charlie

I just got my 6" Island Girl (along with a Chariots of Fire and Voodoo Magic) in the mail yesterday.  I will be certain to let you know how it performs.  It already has quite a few buds developing!  Can't wait to see them open in person.

So, does Island Girl set seed well or have good pollen?  If I can get her to set seed, I'm considering crossing her with my baby Acapulco Gold when it blooms.  I'm hoping for a good multi-colored seedling.  It would be my first attempt at hybridizing.  :)

I don't know if Island Girl sets seed, but Acapulco Gold isnt a good pod parent and is supposed to have very hot pollen.  I just crossed my Belle du Jour with gator pride last week and I am pretty sure a pod is forming, so if you have a belle you could use her to set seed.  I also noticed that many hybridizers use High Voltage, Rainbow Christie and Rosiland to make really nice crosses.  I am just getting into hybridizing and have one seedling from last year (Stolen Kiss (pod) and Flashdancer (pollen)) and it is just now starting to grow alot because its been in stasis until the weather warmed up.  I am going to try and get my hands on those three CVs for hybridizing because it seems that alot of good new cvs have them as their parents!  I am looking for Rosiland in particular because I really want some seedlings that may bloom as both a double and single just like she does!  I need to get my hand on another 'Love Story' because I had mine die this winter :(  Let us know when you start crossing!

Darkhorse, you ordered 3 that bloom a lot! Island Girl might set seed but I've never had any success with the other 2. Finding seed setters that possess the qualities you want is one of the main "tricks" in hybridizing. Almost all varieties will provide useable pollen when the conditions are right but only a few set seed well. Up til now all my Island Girls have been for customers or are needed for wood so I have not tried to set seed with her although I have harvested seeds with island Girl as the pollen parent. Please let us know if it sets seed for you!

Charlie

Hi Kris,

Stolen Kisses x Flash Dancer could be really good! If you get the size of Stolen Kiss with more interesting color contributed by Flash Dancer that would be an excellent result. The 3 seed setters you mention have been useful to me over the years. I did graft some Rosalinds this year, they should be ready June-July. There are no perfect hibiscus yet, all have their positive and negative traits but we keep trying to shift the ratio toward mostly good traits.

Charlie

I hope its a good one, it is definitely a survivor.  Of all the crosses I did last fall, it is the only seedling I got!  I was thinking that it might be a better idea to start hybridizing with your tried and true varieties that already have the great traits of the CVs I already mentioned.  By using your varieties I hope to have the better traits from the parents passed on to these offspring, and thus a bigger gene pool to potentially produce new and different varieties.  Have you found that crossing your best hybrids that you get a higher percentage of worthy offspring?  I am only asking this because I have limited space and would really like to maximize the probability of getting seedlings that are worth keeping rather than throw aways.  I understand that there is a great deal of luck involved but starting with the best should give you the best :) I always seem to go on tangents in these forums, but I just have so many questions about hybridizing and I am really glad that this forum was created so I can pick the brains of seasoned hybridizers!

Do you have any varieties to suggest to add to my current stock that would be good for hybridizing? (I was thinking Rosalind and Living Legend)

Belle Du Jour
Saffron
Acapulco Gold
Blue Ballerina
Fallen Hero
Space Oddity
White Lightning
Junes Dragon
Rainbow Sherbert
Gator Pride

Thanks again Charlie for all the great advice! 

-Kris

Good Morning Kris,

Hybridizing has it's challenges, disappointments, and rewards. It definitely helps to start with good all around cultivars and go from there but there are no guarantees. To meet my goals a new variety must propagate readily, grow with reasonable vigor into a decent looking or better bush, flower soon and often, present the flowers horizontally to upright (not hanging down), and have flowers that are unusually pretty and/or big. When evaluating a new seedling what often happens is that it does one or more of the above well but is lacking in other needed qualities.

This applies to my needs to provide high quality plants to people who count on that. A hobbiest hybridizer can relax those standards - for instance propagating new plants from it may not be an important consideration. There are some places, such as Tahiti, where people use hibiscus blooms by picking them in the early morning for home or personal use and in that case an attractive bush or upward facing flowers are not as important as a pretty flower. Closer to home, this is exactly what has happened in Florida over the last 50 years as those who hybridized hibiscus did so almost totally focused on taking the  the blooms to hibiscus shows. Little attention was paid to anything other than the flower because only the flower was judged.

Anyway, what I am suggesting is that the percentage of "keepers" is likely to be higher for the hibiscus enthusiast than for a commercial grower. I recently calculated that I have grown approx 7000 hibiscus from seeds that I hybridized and I am still growing about 140 of those. That gives me a 2 percent success rate for hybridizing.  Geez, I hope that goes up in the future!

With limited space one has to consider whether growing seedling hybrids or named varieties is best for them. If the standards are relaxed some I think you can get between 10 and 20 percent "keepers" that have a flower you like. All hibiscus flowers have some appeal, even the worst ones, but once you are accustomed to the best ones it is hard to settle for less than that. Seedlings are fun to grow for other reasons, too - they are healthy and vigorous most of the time and easy to grow. The anticipation and the mystery of genetics give them an aura of excitement but one has to be realistic as well.

Back to your actual question  ;)  that is a very nice list of varieties, and contains more seed setters than the normal list could expect to have. Rosalind and Living Legend would make excellent additions to it. Both set seed and make plenty of pollen and both have all the other qualities that I like except that Rosalind is a graft-only cv.

Take care,

Charlie

Hi Charlie,

Wow I had no idea that the number of offspring you keep is so low!  It does make sense that as a commercial grower you look for different qualities than a hobbyist.  I think I have a good start of CVs, and I think once I get Rosalind and Living Legend I can really start coming up with some awesome crosses, I just wish I didn't have to wait so long for the first bloom!  I know you mentioned some Rosalinds should be ready soon, Do you have any LL in larger than the 4' pot size in the works?  Thank you for all your advice and insight!

Best,

Kris

I spontaneously decided to rub some 5th Dimension pollen on one of the Island Girl blooms, so we will see if anything comes of it.  I will continue to experiment with her, and definately let you know how it goes.  So far, I'm really pleased with Island girl... I've already gotten two *huge* blooms, both of which stayed open for three days.  The colors seem to be pretty true, with the edges fading to a nice cream color on the third day.  It's got more depth of color than what you can see in the photos.  A definite keeper!  I'm anxious to see what my Chariots of Fire has to offer as well.  I've had my eye on these cv's for awhile.

Some photos for you guys.  Island Girl twins two days out of the box!!!

Hi Kris,

Now that you mention it we do have Living Legend growing in 6 inch pots now. They should be ready to ship with buds in June. Rosalind in 6 inch is in a similar situation - should bud up and be ready to ship in June.

Hey Darkhorse,

That's a good cross to make. Both are prolific bloomers and there is potential for interesting colors between the 2 of them.

I'm glad that Island Girl has been blooming with pleasing colors. We try not to exaggerate the flowers in our online photos, and it is true that often the real flowers are even more beautiful than the photos.

Charlie

Thats great news, I will be looking forward to purchasing them in June!  That is of course unless they sell out :(  Darkhorse, that island girls flowers are really beautiful and on such a small plant!

-Kris

Charles this is some of the best info I have read thanks for taking tohe time to share it with other. I really admire your Ambition to produce good plants.

Does anyone else's Island Girl grow slowly?  I wonder if it is normal for the cv or if its slow growth is due to something else.

Hey Charlie,

   It seems to me like Island Girl is somewhat rare.  It is because it grows so slowly (my old one did, anyway), or is it a graft-only variety?

Thanks!
Jordan

Hi Jordan,

The Island Girl stock plants that I grow to take cuttings from, grow normally until they are a couple of feet tall and then start branching a lot. I end up with 3 ft high plants that are round shaped with many short stems. I rarely can cut a piece of wood that is long enough for 2 cuttings so I just harvest all the short cuttings and then wait a year for it to grow more. Slower than many other varieties that can yield cuttings twice a year. Sometimes a particular plant of any variety can behave different than the norm for whatever reason. Has your Island Girl done any growing? Surviving spider mites sets them back until they can grow for several months straight without any mites causing them to defoliate. Next summer may be her time "do or die" for you. Hopefully she will "do"!  Please update when something happens.

Charlie

Unfortunately I lost my original Island Girl a few months ago.  I had her for about 8 months before she died, and didn't notice much growth.  It could be that I had a dud, could've been the mites, could've been anything really because last year was very much a learning-from-my-mistakes period with my hibs.   I did get about 5 blooms from her over that period and wow, how beautiful they were.  I ordered another IG on Jan 1 so now that I'm more educated I hope this one will do better.

Jordan I was finally able to get an IG, I will let you know how she does :)  How is your IG #2 doing? 

Chris I think you'll really like IG.  I adored mine from last year and can't wait till #2 blooms!  She's doing great.  Just got potted up w/ worm castings a few days ago from an HVH 4" pot.  I see there were more in the store today and they went fast.  :)

Jordan they went so fast!  I left work a bit early so I could get to my computer :)

Thats good to hear about IG, be sure to take some pics soon!

My little Island Girl has a bud now.  It's also growing very well compared to the plant I had last year.  Nice full bush in almost full sun!

Jordan, I need to see a bush pic of that IG :)

Here you go  :P

Nice looking plant of Island Girl! Seems very happy there.

Charlie

Very nice Jordan, thanks alot for sharing.  Mine is still in its 4' pot but it will be potted up after my move, so I am hoping for some nice growth when that happens! :)

Thanks!  IG is still really small but growing fairly rapidly.  Must have been because of blunders that my last IG grew slowly.  I'm so excited for blooms from this one.  I enjoyed a few flowers from my first IG plant and have really been looking forward to having her again.

Chris, when are you moving?  Must be soon for the beginning of the school year...

Three more weeks till everyone is pruned and boxed up.  I was a bit unsure as to how they would make it a week in the box, but after seeing David's plants make it after a month in the box, I feel alot better about it :)

Good luck with it!  I'm sure your plants will do ok.  I've gotten plants in the mail that I've left in the box an extra day or so if I get them on a day that I get home really late and they've been fine.  :)

Chris, are you going to ship them to yourself or drive them over? Seems like the big danger when driving them is when the vehicle is parked and gets too hot inside. Being in a box would help but hopefully you can park in the shade and get them out of the vehicle asap. One nice advantage to moving them in a closed box is that the water in the pot lasts a long time, even longer if you slip a plastic bag around the pot and close it around the main stem the way we do when shipping.

Charlie

Hi Charlie,

I will most likely be driving them.  The plan is to have them in one box and just take that box into the hotel at night.  Luckily the route to WA shouldnt be very hot in September.  I was surprised that all the plants made it from CA to CO seeing as they were in the car for three days while in Denver, since I had to frantically find a place to live.  Those days were very hot, 95 plus days outside, not in the car!  Its pretty amazing how much heat hibiscus can tolerate, compared to cold.   

Does anyone find island girl to be a variety that likes cooler weather or maybe more humidity?  The reason I ask is when in Colorado, my island girl did not grow or do much of anything in the sunny 80+ degree days.  However, since I moved its been subjected to cooler temps and higher humidity and its been sending out new leaves and I see microbuds forming! :)  Very different than how it did back in sunny and dry Colorado.  I was a bit skeptical that I would see any blooms till spring, but I find that hibiscus like to surprise you in one way or another :)

On a side note if anyone grows Cattleya orchids, the HVH fertilizer seems to be yielding fairly nice results.  I started to use the HVH fertilizer on my orchids (which I grow in the same area as the hibiscus) in June and they have started breaking multiple leads (leaves that eventually flower) and are now setting bud.  In fact, ive been using HVH fertilizer on all my other plants and they really seem to be doing very well on it.  Given that hibiscus are tropical, it would make sense that other tropical species enjoy similar nutrient profiles, but to all you out there that grow other houseplants, HVH fertilizer is great for them too! 

My Island Girl grew well and bloomed here this summer with temps in the 90s+ in half day sun.  She's growing much more vigorously than the IG I had last year, so maybe this cv is a little inconsistent or sometimes takes a little time to get going...?

Ah thanks Jordan for that info, she does seem to be a more variable variety it seems.  Thats good to hear that she is doing good for you now :)  It will be interesting to see if she blooms and grows well for me here. 

So many of these varieties show different growth habits depending on the conditions they are in. That said, Island Girl in my conditions has grown to a medium side bush that then makes lots of short stems that flower. I still have the original plant that has been about 4 feet tall for the last several years. It might grow differently if I did not take cuttings off of it once a year. In any case for the original to still be around after 8 years shows it to be resilient.

Charlie

Wow Charlie, great picture!  Her blooms are so unique, I havent seen any variety that blooms with the beige edge and purple, pink, red body.  I bet I will get the more purple blooms when she blooms in a few weeks.  I am really happy that I was able to get one, I can't wait to try and cross her :) 

Great photo Charlie!  Did you get the new lens you were hoping for?  I want this Island Girl now that I see the photos.  And I love resilient!! 

Kristen, I have an excellent lens that I bought for my Nikon DSLR that cost more than the camera - but it is not a macro. That is still on my wish list. sigh.......

Charlie

Everyone is in the DSLR club eh :) 

I really do need a good camera, the phone camera is prob not the best :P

Based on your photos, the phone camera does pretty well. iPhone, right? Maybe not as versatile as a dedicated camera but the colors are pleasing.

Charlie