Odd Rosalind Flower

[LJG]

I have never seen this before in any hibiscus. I thought for a second I had a grafted plant. I don't. I got this "Rosalind" this spring and it just opened this flower. Any idea why?





This is the whole plant:

[Charlie]

Hi LJG,

Why do you think your Rosalind is not grafted? The pink double flower is from Pride of Hankins, the standard root stock for grafted hibiscus. You can see the shoot of Pride of Hankins in the photo - it is the tall stem on the far right side of the plant, showning reddish wood as is typical of young branches of Pride of Hankins.

You can let it grow but already it is showing that it is more vigorous than Rosalind. Better would be to follow the stem all the way back to where it joins the main trunk of the plant and then cut this branch off flush with the main trunk. While you are there look for any other stems of POH that may have started to grow and cut them off, too. You should be able to spot the graft line in the trunk. Even though it may be faint by this point one or more diagonal lines running vertically on the main trunk can often be seen on grafted plants. Everything lower down than that line will be root stock and all growth from that will be "suckers" that need to be cut off so that don't compete with Rosalind.

Thanks for sending this - it's a great example.

Charlie

[LJG]

Hi Charlie,

I got this from you this spring. I did not know you grafted these. I have many grafted plants (mostly trees) in my garden and can always find the graft. I could not here. I though it was some odd sport.

Thanks.

[Charlie]

A sport would have been interesting! The way I graft doesn't leave much of a sign and after a couple of years you can't see the graft unless you know what to look for and even then maybe not.

Charlie

[Louis]

hello charlie,

i noticed on one of my voodoo magic plants, your grafts, done very nicely i might add.

i am experimenting on a few grafts and was wondering how you do yours to get a perfect circle

louis

[Charlie]

HI Louis, I never saw your post here until now. Describing how we graft is not very easy or clear using just words. One of these days I will make a video which will be much better able to show how it is done. It's quite simple, really, but one has to practice a few grafts on wood that doesn't matter to get the hang of it. After graft care is as important as how the graft is done. Even after growing 100K's of grafted plants successfully I managed to kill some this spring by not being vigilant enough as conditions changed from winter to spring and temperatures soared in the greenhouse. Ah well, it hurts but there is always next time!

Charlie