Rhododendron impeditum and luteum flowering again (end of August)

[Corrado & Rina]

Dear all,

Our Rhododendron luteum and Rhododendron impeditum have decided to flower again .... on the 21 / 08 .... never happened before. Is that normal?

Best,

Corrado

[johnw]

Corrado  That's not unusual at all for R. impeditum.  We've had it flower 3 times one year, often it re-flowers in autumn and every year it usually has a few flowers open every month from June onward.  I think our growing season is  simply too long for these alpine-arctic species.

It is surprising though that you have R. luteum in flower.  My guess is some of the forms from Turkey might just flower the second time if they were subjected to an early drought followed by abundant rains.  Perhaps those forms originate in very summer dry locations that only see rain when cold weather arrives. 

john 

[Corrado & Rina]

Thanks John, very useful, I agree that impeditum behaves like that .... it is just that it has plenty of flowers rather than just the odd one ....

I think you may be right about luteum, we had a considerably long very dry and hot spell (watering the garden every day, sometimes twice a day) followed by some very wet days compounded by watering every day when it did not rain .... I have also started fertilising with low concentration sea weed based fertiliser (25%).... very interesting!

Corrado

[johnw]

Corrado  - I should have also said that impeditum will respond with a heavier second or more flowering with that long drought followed by heavy rains scenario.

john