November Flower Photos of the Day

[blupit007]

Happy November everyone!
Here is a beautiful Simple Pleasures and Tahitian Princess.

[farmer d]

Beautiful blooms Kristen - glad to hear you're doing ok.  I hope things start returning to normal for you and your family soon...

Farmer D

[farmer d]

some bush shots for those interested

1st photo: bottom left corner:Tahitian Royal Court, back left: Inner Compass, Vin Electrique (tall & back corner), Climax (in front of VE), Tahitian Princess & Daisy Mae rt corner

4th photo: lft to rt: Daisy Mae, Cindy's Heart & Tahitian Lavender Mist (one mass now), Summer Fun & Tahitian Lavender Pastel & Living Legend (one mass now), Scintillating (behind LL bloom) and Tahitian Pretty Boy for right

5th photo: Flirtatious behind plumeria leaves, Ingenue, The Path, Some Like It Hot (big bush in corner), Tahitian Royal Court next to The Path

[Doll]

Kristen, your Simple Pleasures is outstanding.

Darren, your bushes look great.

[helixturnhelix]

  

First bloom seedling:  Infinity x Bluebook second seedling.  This seedling has been growing well with good vigor and is really well budded bloom is 5 inches.  Dark dark colors on this one, hopefully clones will grow well too!  

[helixturnhelix]

Here are some later in the day photos of the new seedling, Arabian Princess and another seedling I like with pastel colors.   You can really see how dark the color is in contrast to the other CVs.

[Aleksandr]

Chris, your Nightcrawler is fantastic!! My congratulations!! 

[farmer d]

John thank you for the compliment.  I feel like half of my bushes are close to where they should be and the rest have some significant growing to do to get closer to their potential.  I knew I would be really hampering both bloom and bush results for this growing season once I replanted them all but in the long run should be a nice payoff (as long as there are no freezes this winter).

Chris another dark killer bloom!  I bet they would look equally as good and proper in other parts of the world where it gets cold and dark during winter, say the Ukraine!

Here are four shots of Acapulco Gold - 5 counting John's pretty bloom for today that show how fun this cv is as each bloom tends to be different.  I love it when the blooms are weather sensitive, everyday something to look forward to...definitely shifting back to a more yellow look as the temps continue to cool and daylight shortens...

Farmer D

[farmer d]

Here are some more bush shots.  All these bushes are around 6 ft tall currently (including VD plant now).  What I wanted to show is some of the issues I have been seeing with my most mature and hardy bushes.  My fault as I continue to learn the new parameters of what these exotic hibiscus need now that I have proper soil and lots of room for root growth.

This planter faces towards the south and has a brick wall behind it so it gets super hot during summer.  I severely under watered it due to last year's experience with the horrible clay soil prison holes that let me get away with very little water due to the clay's ability to hold water without letting the roots breath at all.  

As a result this year I have seen this bushes lose some of their leafing down low and in the middle.  Chariots of Fire shows this best, and on the side of Rainbow Sherbet you can see how much leafing it has slowly lost over this year too.  Flickering Flame was also looking a little skimpy but thanks to swiveling a sprinkler head towards it for the last couple of months it has exploded in growth to the point that you can hardly see Bridal Path behind it anymore.

So what I've learned in the outdoors is that with the proper soil that lets the roots breath and drains well once these plants get going and are happy they like lots of water and often.  Totally the opposite of last year.  Now the trick is to see if during winter will they at some point shut down and stop wanting water like the last two years or with the new soil will they continue to want to be watered?

I have also noticed that how they grow is quite different too - probably a bit closer to how they might grow in a greenhouse.  The new leafing tends to be a lot softer and much bigger than what I've been seeing in the past.  And overall the size of leaves I now have on almost all of my plants is much bigger than before with many plants with leaves as big as my spread out hand.  Even when they are not blooming these plants are attractive just with the bush.  Green paradise!  I added a couple of pics from before so you can see what happens when the rootballs have maxed out the small holes I originally dug for them along with proper watering - blooms galore.

Oh yeah, one other thing I am hypothesizing is that I will see a lot less blooms for a while as my plants continue to grow in size as their root systems increase in size for a while.  Once they max out their growing places I bet they will shift their energy from growing to reproduction (flowering).  You can see from my bush shots the past few days not a lot of blooms anymore which has been the theme for a while now.  I know Chris had mentioned flush bloomers, but I'm not seeing a whole lot in the way of growing and prolific blooming at the same time here.  Temps have been pretty good so not sure if any other factors are involved here.

Farmer D

[Ernest]

John, that's a wonderful photo of AG.
Chris, fantastic seedlings. That Infinity cross has really darkened up since the one you showed earlier.
Darren, I'm really liking that Rodeo Drive. I'm going to have to see if I can free up some more planting space.
Cooler nighttime temps here are starting to affect some blooms. Some from today:
Night Runner
Silver Dragon
Valentine's Day
Burnt Saffron
Daisy Mae
Magic Crystal

Erny

[Ernest]

A few more:
Summer Shore
Heartbreak Hotel
Blue Ballerina
Angel's Wings
Louise Bennett
Victoria's Touch

[blupit007]

Chris!!!!  Nightcrawler is so beautiful! 
Beautiful blooms everyone!

[helixturnhelix]

Thank you everyone!  
Darren,  I think that this one would be dark for people in warmer climates as well.  My grow area stays in the 60-75 degree range which is not really cool growing.  When I lived in Seattle, my apt got really cool in the winter (it even froze one night)  so I was able to get some awesome colors on Raindrop and My Blue Heaven.  

I just snapped a picture of this seedling at 5:00 pm and the coloration is still really saturated.  Could it be a blue seedling that has minimal fading?!  This one needs to be grown in different climates to be sure, but this first bloom sure feels promising  

[farmer d]

Darren, I'm really liking that Rodeo Drive. I'm going to have to see if I can free up some more planting space.

Erny

This is my second Rodeo Drive plant as last year's got fried on my porch when out of town last Oct.  Came home to it full of spider mites and deteriorating fast.  Plus back then I was using the wrong type of soil so when I watered it just made it worse until deceased.

I've had this one since April so I have been able to observe that it grows rather nicely, so far a little bit of a sprawly grower but I did replant it to another spot and it didn't even flinch so that was impressive.  The blooms vary a lot with the form kind of all over the place but then again it is a young plant so that might sort itself out as it matures.  Likes to bloom a lot, what I really like is it totally has the Rainbow Christie eye and when the form is good like today's it's a pretty amazing look.

On the HVH online store page the icon for multi colored blooms is RD with quite the red look.

I wonder if Charlie has any plans on ever selling this one again - I haven't seen it in the store for 2 years now.

Farmer D

[Aleksandr]

Chris another dark killer bloom!  I bet they would look equally as good and proper in other parts of the world where it gets cold and dark during winter, say the Ukraine!

Farmer D

Farmer D, great idea  
I like this flower enormously and hope to get it one day....

This one needs to be grown in different climates to be sure, but this first bloom sure feels promising  

I'm ready...