Rhododendrons April 2008

[Maggi Young]

another little rhodo with big personality in leaves and buds... R. impeditum

[Joakim B]

Maggi thanks for the input about the lilac one. Yes it is bigger than 1.5 cm long flowers but the bush is smaller than Yours .
It has fewer flowers though so You win by a landslide .
Generally there is a clue I thought I heard somewhere always, but with the word Blue tit one would not directly associate with that flower.

BTW the forum is slow as asphalt to day. Maybe only for me?

Kind regards
Joakim

[Casalima]

Wonderful rhodies, Maggi!! It is truly amazing how many you manage to have in your garden. I particularly like Cowslip!
Are there pictures missing from message 13?

Many more rhododendrons in my part of Portugal, compared with Joakim's area.

Forum slow one minute and as fast as normal the next minute, as far as I can see.

Chloë

[TC]

I have just been watching the Beechgrove Garden on BBC Scotland.  They were doing a spot on the Rhododendrons at the RBGE.
It was mentioned that this was a poor flowering season with many varieties practically without blooms.  Because of the cold wet summer last year, many plants failed to make flowering buds, although vegetative growth was O.K.  This echos what I have been seeing at Benmore and Brodick.  Some of the large leafed varieties have no flower buds at all.  I had a look at my Loderi and there is not one flower bud to be seen.  This will be the first time in 8 years it has not flowered.  It does not seem to have affected the smaller varieties.
One happy note for me, my cinnabarinum has flowered for the first time.  I took the attached pictures five minutes ago at 2035 before the next downpour starts.

[Maggi Young]

Thanks, Chloë. Yes, there are six pix missing from post 13, but I have added them there now! They must have got dropped off somehow when the Forum was being awkward earlier.
Do go back and see them... they are  crackers!

Forum is slow again at the moment... do hope Fred can find a solution....he has already fed the hamster that works the wheel extra food!


'Cowslip' is a nice thing.... two tone without being garish.  It is a williamsianum x wardii var wardii hybrid, raised by Lord Aberconway  and registered in 1927.


Tom, I regret that the weather from last summer has indeed affected the flowering on quite a few of our dwarf rhodos, as well as the bigger chaps.

Lovely bloom on your R. cinnarbarinum... I had to destroy ours because they were hosts to the powdery mildew.... since they were removed we have had less bother. It was very sad to lose them , though.
These others you show look just fine.....great colour to cheer the garden. The 'Blue Diamond' looks right.....thought here that is another that was scrapped because it took mildew all the time.

[Lvandelft]

Maggi, in winter you told that your Rhodo's would recover, after I questioned this when you showed pictures of them with those hanging leaves.
Now I can see it myself. It's remarkable how much strength these plant have.
Fantastic!
BTW, you must have had a very nice day, because the "Aberdeen Grey" walls, as I remember from two years ago, even look whitish.
Almost mediterranean.     

[ian mcenery]

Maggi great to see spring is busting out all over  Love that edgworthii a well grown plant indeed 

Tom nice to see that cinnabarinum in flower . The only one of this type I have in flower at present is a hybrid Alison Johnstone. I will try and get a piccy in the morning

[tboland]

Wow Maggi ! What a display and collection!  I still have none open outside...maybe late May.  My peak is mid-late June.   In the hoophouse at work we have a couple open...I'll try to get pics this week.

[johnw]

Maggi - You really do have the bug.

Is your keiskei x spiciferum Waxbill or Wheatear? I keep mixing the two up.

Love the omeiense, just getting that one going here, microleucum and that very special impeditum.

I'm partial to those lepidotes.

johnw

[TC]

Maggi - You really do have the bug.

Is your keiskei x spiciferum Waxbill or Wheatear? I keep mixing the two up.

Love the omeiense, just getting that one going here, microleucum and that very special impeditum.

I'm partial to those lepidotes.

johnw

The Keiskei x spiciferum has no name.  I bought it from Glendoick several years ago as an un-named introduction.  It even says this on the label

[johnw]

Maggi - You really do have the bug.

Is your keiskei x spiciferum Waxbill or Wheatear? I keep mixing the two up.

Love the omeiense, just getting that one going here, microleucum and that very special impeditum.

I'm partial to those lepidotes.

johnw

The Keiskei x spiciferum has no name.  I bought it from Glendoick several years ago as an un-named introduction.  It even says this on the label

Tom - I got my two plants at Glendoick as well. Both I believe are keiskei x spiciferum and understood they had both been named. One appeared to be tender and expired - that may have been Wheatear.  There certainly could be others.  I can't say I'm fond of these striped-flowered hybrids but would make an exception for Ginny Gee since it is such a good-doer and a flowering machine.

keiskei x pemakoense by Barry Starling is just coming into bloom here. He recommends a bit of shade as it has a tendency to bud too heavily which obscures the foliage.

Barry is tentatively scheduled as a speaker at our rhodo chapter this autumn which is rather exciting.

johnw

[ian mcenery]

Here are a couple of piccies of R Alison Johnstone in flower at present. It is a cinnarbarinum concatennans x yunnanense hybrid

[TC]

I have attached the label and this is as much as I know about it.  Ginny Gee always does well, as the picture shows.
Another dwarf I bought from Glendoick last week is Rh. Proteoides. It looked interesting and again, I bought it on a whim.  I have now found out that it is grown for its shape and foliage as it takes 40 years to flower !!!!  That's me well and truly stuffed !  Maybe I can pass it on to my grandchildren.

[TC]

Pictures failed to load.

Ian,
I wish I had a garden big enough to plant larger rhododendrons.  Thirty years ago, I had Lady Chamberlain, Concatennans and Cin. Roylei but a severe winter in the mid 70's did for them along with Praecox ( lowest temperature was -20c and it was below freezing for weeks )

[ian mcenery]

Tom my lady chamberlain was cut to the ground probably in the same winter but came back from the base and I now have 2 forms of this but they are leggy although the flowers are wonderful. I also have a couple of cinnarbarinum species with different colours. Seems the botanists have labelled these as different though I saw loads of cinnabarinum in Bhutan last year in all the colours you can imagine from red through orange to yellow all growing side by side

Like the proteoides always think the foliage ones are nice

Here is another favourite R Loderi King George the individual flowers are over 6 inches across and I'm sorry you can't catch the scent lovely