red hibiscus

[topshelf12]

  Hello everyone,
I am looking for a true red hibiscus with no orange in it and will hold its color well. I am also looking for the same thing but with white in some form in the center. Any suggestions would be great
thanks
Norm
cold & grey silicon valley

[helixturnhelix]

Black Dream, Dragon Slayer or Heart of my Heart are my picks!

[farmer d]

Norm my experience with Scarlet Beauty has been exceptional.  What I love about it is the wet and waxy look it has and best of all the eye is sometimes whitish, sometimes pale lavender, sometimes just all red.  The blooms reflex first day and then go to a really nice form to enjoy.  Nice plant that really likes to bloom for me and has been easy to grow.  Very happy with it!

Golly gosh, it even bloomed today for you to see...




Farmer D

[topshelf12]

  thanks to both of you. I have scarlet Beauty and plan on getting dragon slayer. I am looking for a true red like Heart Fire or I think it is called Star spangled Banner bright red  with a white eye.
Norm

[Charlie]

Red Light is a good one to consider. Blooms last multiple days. Cherry Glow is a nice new red and white. The online store will feature several solid reds and red and whites when it opens for 2012. We think the new ones are all worthy so it's good to hear people's real life experiences.

Charlie

[Ernest]

Velvet Illusion is one of my favorite reds. Bessie is an extremely bright and vivid red double. I don't know if Charlie carries that but here is a recent picture of mine.

Erny

[helixturnhelix]

Erny,

If you like Velvet Illusion, you would probably love Scarlet Beauty.  I think that is considered an improved Velvet Illusion, as it has a very nice bush and branches well.  Velvet Illusion didn't branch or grow well for me while I had it.  Do you have a picture of your bush to share?

[roadrunner]

Velvet Illusion didn't grow well for me either, tho it had a few nice blooms before the spider mites ended its short stay.

dave

[Charlie]

I still have Velvet Illusion and in fact had a few blooms in early December. It's a great flower - big, heavy textured and with a unique red/pink color that none of my photos of it really capture well. However, it was an unusual case where High Voltage did not manage to improve the bush of the other parent Sun Shower and we ended up with a bush even worse than Sun Shower. Ah well, I've kept a few varieties with splendid flowers despite their bushes such as Cherry Appaloosa and Velvet Illusion though I'm reluctant to sell them unless the collector knows what they are getting.

We recently had a new seedling flower that reminded both Cindy and I of Velvet Illusion and I'm hoping it will root and be a good replacement for Velvet Illusion.

Charlie

[roadrunner]

That would be great Charlie. I tried most of the usual treatments to bring my VI back after the spider mite attack, but once it went into that decline it didn't respond to anything.

I appear to be losing Over the Rainbow the same way. Any more of those in the works?


dave

[Charlie]

Dave, Over The Rainbow is one of my favorite flowers. I seem to make the same mistake every year by selling most of the Over the Rainbow that are propagated so have never built up sufficient stock of it. There will be a few of it this coming year, but very few, as I try to hold back some for stock so more can be available in the future.

Charlie

[roadrunner]

Thanks Charlie. It's one of my favorite flowers too. Mine isn't gone yet, but it's down to about half a dozen tiny leaves and showing no signs of rebounding. It's on my wishlist. I'll need to keep an eye out for it.

dave

[Ernest]

Chris, thanks for the suggestion. I got a Scarlet Beauty in a 4" pot from Charlie about a month ago and it is doing well (now in a 6" pot). I also got a Cherry Glow because I like the vivid reds and it looks great in the picture Charlie has in his gallery. My Velvet Illusion bush looks pretty good. I planted it in the ground along the front wall of our house which faces south. It is partially shaded by some plumerias. It is about 5' tall and full of branches; a few buds starting and one that may open soon. I'll post a picture when it does. The pictures below show the bush from slightly different angles. It's hard to get a good photo of it because it is crammed in between a large dwarf plumeria on one side and Haut Coutere on the other. The first shot shows part of the plumeria on the L and HC on the R. The second shows HC on the R. Third shows a better view of the base of the plant.

Erny

[helixturnhelix]

Wow your plants look great Erny!  I guess Velvet Illusion needs to be in the ground to reach its full potential, thanks for sharing!

[Ernest]

Thanks Chris. I give all credit to the ideal growing conditions where I happen to live. I find that a lot of the cvs that people complain have poor bushes seem to thrive in the ground here. I wish I could claim some of the credit but for several years before I found HVH my plants survived and thrived despite almost complete neglect. For example I never fertilized or sprayed for pests and relied on whatever water they got from my sprinkler system. Now that I am more attentive to their needs I am starting to see gratifying results.

Erny

[Charlie]

That Velvet Illusion bush is very impressive, Erny. The ground must help but I think one of the other tricks with these hibiscus is keeping them alive long enough for them to fulfill their potential. That big old Living Legend of yours looks like it is there to stay!

When I first started posting photos of hibiscus on the internet in the mid 1990's I put out a request to Florida hibiscus enthusiasts for photos of their plants. I received quite a few in the mail but I have to tell you none of the plants looked anywhere near as full and nice as the ones we have seen posted here. I'm not sure if the varieties have gotten better or the care techniques are better - most likely both are true. I suspect that on your trip to Florida you will see a lot of big garden variety types of hibiscus but not too many of the exotics outside of the nurseries.

Just a caution - if you bring any plants back check them out for Florida pests very carefully. Snow scale and hibiscus gall midge and pink mealybug do not exist here in California but you could easily introduce them to your garden. Once there they are hard to get rid of and can do a lot of damage. Snow scale and midge have already spread from Florida to Louisiana and Texas on hibiscus plants. Still hoping California won't be next.

Charlie

[roadrunner]

Charlie apparently Arizona quarantine laws make it very difficult for me to order any hibiscus from that part of the country, essentially the whole gulf coast area.  Some of the online hibiscus vendors I've inquired with in Florida and Texas either won't ship plants to Arizona or the much higher shipping costs combined with the additional $65 or higher fee for the required phyto certificate for each order makes it financial unexceptable for me to even consider placing an order with these vendors.  Wow!, that was a mouthful.  This is probably a good thing since I'd hate to get any of those 3 gulf coast hibiscus pests introduced into my collection. I just don't think it's worth the risk. I dread the thought of any of them getting established in California, my sole source for exotic hibiscus, eg you guys.  Spider mites are more than enough to deal with, even with Kontos in my arsenal.

dave

[Ernest]

Thanks Charlie. Besides living in the right climate I also attribute much of my success with these plants to the fact that many of them were received in 2 gallon pots and therefore strong and healthy with good root systems that facilitated the transfer from pot to ground. I have also noticed  considerable increases in growth and flowering since I started using your Special Blend and Booster--also Super Nova and Fulmag.
I am not going to bring any plants back from Florida--just looking. Should I see something spectacular I may place an order in the future but only if it was something that you don't offer.
All the plants I have gotten from you have been so robust and healthy that it would be foolish to risk getting an inferior or diseased product from another source.

Erny

[Charlie]

DAve, that whole phytosanitary certificate (that says the plants are free of pests and diseases) approach is flawed. We have to do it for all international orders and some US shipments so I have a lot of experience with it. What happens is an inspector comes to the nursery that is shipping, inspects the plants the grower says are the ones going out, and then writes up the certificate and leaves. The grower has several days or weeks depending on where the plants are going to pack them up and ship them out. This means they could still become infested or the grower can substitute other non-inspected plants after the inspector leaves. It's more or less a worthless system that is expensive and does not achieve the intended result. The only system that would work would be for the plants to be carefully inspected at the receiving end and then rejected if they are infested with pests. That actually happens with most countries which makes the whole phyto certificate program redundant and kind of pointless.

Charlie

[Ernest]

Charlie, thanks for exposing the truth about that so-called phytosanitary certificate. Sounds like a government program and does about as much good as airport searches. It underscores an important basic principle: anything you buy should come from a reputable dealer who has a track record.

Erny

[davidwood]

Charlie, thanks for exposing the truth about that so-called phytosanitary certificate. Sounds like a government program and does about as much good as airport searches. It underscores an important basic principle: anything you buy should come from a reputable dealer who has a track record.

Erny

You have to be even more careful if you buy from out her{Asia},phytosanitary certificates are given free with some purchases in Thailand and cost 3 dollars for 10 in Vietnam. no inspector [I doubt they even exist here] ever goes near the plants.

[roadrunner]

Charlie, thanks for the clarification on the phyto certificates. Seems like another government program implemented for the purpose of collecting fees more than anything else. I wonder who is pocketing all those extra $$$ to be wasted on what later?

dave