Rhododendrons April 2008

[johnw]

Tom  - Thanks so much for the wonderful pictures from Benmore. The R. grande is supremely beautiful and those skunk cabbages are a joy. The latter seem late here though the flower buds are just moving now that the weather has warmed up.

Attached is the Ludlow & Sherriff #2847 thomsonii just beginning to open yesterday in the south where it was 21c, so, in some regards, we are not too far behind . Also what I think is an auriculatum with an exceptional habit - from Peter Wharton's 1994 Guizhou seed collection. Finally I found 2 buds on a 6ft rex Berkley x rex Quartz (again 1994) - this may well be the first rex to ever flower east of Canadian Rockies. The buds are on the north side of the plant just to confound the experts.

johnw

 

[tboland]

John, I'd like to say I had ANY rhody about to bloom but who am I kidding!  However, at the Bot. Garden (Memorial University of Newfoundland Botanical Garden) our coldhouse is warmer than outside and the first rhodies have opened probably a month earlier than those outside.  Here is Madison Snow and (impeditum X moupinense)...I am dubious about that hybrid.  What do you think John?

[johnw]

re: impeditum x moupinense

Todd - It's certainly hard to see any moupinense there, the leaves are closer in size to impeditum than the mean of the two species. And yet I would be hard pressed to explain the pink flower, pinker than I remember. What other species would give that pink and cross with impeditum. Hmm?  The flower size is not intermediate either.

Coincidental than you should post that as I talking to the hybridizer Cpt. Steele tonight. I mentioned that moupinense itself seemed fully hardy in the south here, unfortunately mine is a white one. The impeditum x moupinense came up in the conversation as I lost mine and he lost his back-ups, both caused by shade.  He asked if I could round up a few cuttings in Newfoundland!

Madison Snow looks great and may be one of the very best Leach selections, strange as he was noted for his elepidotes.

johnw

[johnw]

(impeditum X moupinense)...I am dubious about that hybrid.  What do you think John?

Todd - I'm still pondering... I think of 'Ramapo' which is fastigiatum x carolinianum or the reverse with leaves not that much bigger than fastigiatum.  So maybe it is possible the parentage of this hybrid is correct. The leaves certainly have a lustre we don't associate with impeditum, from moupinense perhaps. Here's another thought, impeditum sold, in North America at least, are in fact fastigiatum. I wonder if Steele had the true species back then as it would have been quite a rarity. Maybe fastigiatum x moupinense is more likely.

johnw

[tboland]

The habit of the hybrid in question is quite like Ramapo, expect the flowers are pinkish, so maybe Steele did indeed use fastigiatum.

[Paul T]

And down here in the Southern Hemisphere I have Rhododendron lineariifolium flowering at the moment.  Its cool having a Rhododendron flowering here amongst the autumn blaze.

[Joakim B]

Nice Rhododendrons
Here are some cultivars only two.
John Walter and an unknown lilac. The lilac one is not particularly funny but is getting better now with more acid soil.
I lost (Christmas) Cheer and from pics seen here it was a loss.

To compensate this loss I bought 3 nice Rhods at Lidl!!! They looked nice and cost 6€ so I got two Cunningham and one Nova Zembla if memory serves me right. Two whites and one red. The "flower buds" where growth buds so no flowers this year I think. Maybe on the Cunningham since it is often a repeat bloomer in Sweden and I hope even more so here in Portugal.
Here is the John Walter I wrote Walker so had to fix it.
and the standard lilac.

Kind regards
Joakim

[Maggi Young]

Now then, tried to make some posts yesterday but the Forum Gremlin was working to a go slow and kept kicking me off! Here's hoping for an easier time today......
 I'll try posting the pix first and edit later to get the text in 

An old and reliable hybrid, R. 'Blue Tit'

A williamsianum hybrid, 'Cowslip'

'Cowslip' has pale creamy yellow flowers with a pretty salmon pink tinge

One of Cox' bird named hybrids, 'Crane'... an interesting choice of name since I think of Cranes as being tall, thin birds, and this is quite a chubby little plant!

'Crane' flowers are a bit more yellow than the photos show... primrose yellow,  almost.

This is a hybrid which never fails to cover itself in flowers and even has a  scent on warmer days...it is
 'Dora Amateis' which is a minus var minus x ciliatum cross. The  R. ciliatum blood is where the scent comes from.

The view to the front door is a bit congested!

Here are the buds of a R. edgeworthii x lindleyi cross.

R. impeditum 'Moerheimii'

This is a plant which won many prizes, before it grew too big to be lifted and carried in a pot... R. orthocladum var. microleucum.... small clusters of tiny white flowers... this plant is about thirty years old and still only a couple of feet high.

[Maggi Young]

so, we seem to be in working order here so on I go.....
 another edit to include the text....
R. 'Phalarope'.... this tends to sprawl a bit, but is still very pretty, making a light, open display.

A view across a very congested bed of little rhodos.

A view across to some larger rhodos, incl. R. faberi ( the one showing white flowers in this shot)

 A view past R. 'Phalarope'

 Another view to the front of the house

 A small  digression....While I was out "snapping" the BD was leaving for his swim..... this is the west driveway.....

A view looking back up the west drive from the road... lots of bulbs living happily in the seemingly hostile environment of the rock hard and dry driveway.

R. yakushimanum x recurvoides

R. 'Yellowhammer'...  a good plant to force flowers for Christmas decorations... grows quite tall, over six feet with us , but has dainty foliage and the charming yellow bells are only about 2 cms long.
'Yellowhammer' is  a R. sulfurem x flavidum var flavidum cross.

[Maggi Young]

some more:
R. aff. tatsienense, coll. Roy Lancaster

A bud of R. bureauvii

A view up through the branches of R. bureauvii

 I think this is R. campylogynum " plum Branklyn"

Close up of R. ciliatum

 The buds of the sturdy yellow, 'Curlew'

 The deepest pink bud!

Two shots of the flowers of 'Dora Amateis'

A fuzzy look through the flowers of R. primuliflorum to 'Phalarope' beyond

[Maggi Young]

what have we got next?
........
Two shots of R. faberi flowers

R. 'Ptarmigan
 and a closup , showing some weather damage

R. hippophaioides... lovely rounded clusters of bright flowers held in a neat ruff of leaves on a plant about four feet high ( 120cms)  after twenty-five years.

This is a seedling, leaves about 6 to 7 cms long, six feet tall, omly just starting  to give flowers... cannot think what it is called!!

R. keiskei, a wee shoot through other foliage

A R. lepidotum hybrid

view of bed, to SSW

R. nitidulum Omiense KR185

[Maggi Young]

and.....
Rhododendron saluenense

Another I cannot remember the name of..

R. sulfureum

R. taliense x lacteum... not flowering very fully this year.
Two closer shots of the taliense x flowers

The tiny R. cephalanthum crebreflorum

A view across to SSW with R. aff tatsienense

[Joakim B]

Maggi when You go You go for real
Lovely bunch of pics.
When I saw "blue tit" it is not blue at all?! It resembels a lot the one I have as unknown "lilac".

Hope to see more but I do not have more here.
Kind regards
Joakim

[Maggi Young]

to complete these April photos, here are some Yak shots!
 Two pix of R. yakushimanum buds. This rhood is superb in it's own right and also makes a great parent.

Two shots of R. yakushimanum x recurvoides.. these flowers have good deep pink buds and hold the flower colour well as they open, unlike quite a lot of pink rhodos.


Two shots of R. yakushimanum x tsariense


Joakim.... you are right... the plant is not "blue" at all.... but then again, real cranes ( birds)  are not yellow
The flowers are tiny, only about 1.5 cms long and the whole bush is about 100cms high by 150cms across after nearly forty years.

Your "lilac" is a large flowered type, which looks a lot like a R. ponticum type to me.


By the way, Friends, apologies for mixing metric and imperial measurements in an earlier post!! Six feet  = 1.80m

[Maggi Young]

Joakim, I seldom get time when the weather is nice enough to go out with the camera... I was just lucky on Monday!
The weather often conspires to spoil flowers before I get the chance to capture them, too 
This year I am going to try to get shots of as many as possible, and of their buds and foliage stages, also... doubt that I will manage to do that, there are more than 350 rhodos here, a number which absolutely astounds me, given the size of the garden ... but I will make an effort!
Here's a shot showing the surface of the aromatic leaves on this little rhodo which has lovely big buds on.....again, cannot remember what it is meantime!! It usually comes back to me eventually!!