Miniature Hostas

[mark smyth]

I've added a page on my web site to show my miniature Hosta collection
http://marksgardenplants.com/hostas.htm

A few photos are missing which I'll take them when the rain stops

[TheOnionMan]

I've added a page on my web site to show my miniature Hosta collection
http://marksgardenplants.com/hostas.htm

A few photos are missing which I'll take them when the rain stops

"when the rain stops" wish we had some of that here!

Mark, those are some dang cute miniature hosta,  Cats Eye is sooOOOOO tiny!... love it! I also grow some of the small ones.  Maybe I'll post some here, since you started the thread.

[angie]

Mark you have got yourself some beauties I liked Holy Mouse Ears and your Cats Eyes I have never seen one as tiny... one slug meal

Angie

[mark smyth]

Mark, its been raining - drizzle to hard rain - for most about three weeks now

Angie, no slugs or snails in my troughs. I give them something else to eat. Something else has just started to eat the leaves whick means I must take action soon. Vine weevils!

The photos of plants in pots wil be replaced with them in the ground

Cats Eyes is sooooo cute and small enough to be a meal in one go for slugs and snails. I was told yesterday it's getting quite rare now

[Stephenb]

Great selection, Mark! I had a friend near here who had a nice collection of these (she had them in the open garden). Not often you see them (I can't recall seeing them anywhere else actually).

I have Hosta minor (from seed), just coming into flower at the moment (pictures). I presume that these miniatures are derived from different species. Do you know which?

[mark smyth]

Stephen I dont know but I'll ask the grower over here. His collection is jaw dropping amazing

Many miniatures are sports from another selection. I'm not an expert but I think Holy Mouse ears, Frosted Mouse Ears and Snow Mouse Ears are sports from Blue Mouse Ears.

One of my plants Lakeside Elphin Fire has a reverse sport going back to the plant it came from. It was Hosta Tiny White Lines.

Tiny white lines is a hybrid between 'Sum and Substance' and H. venusta

[mark smyth]

Stephen your box of matches gave me a good idea

[Lesley Cox]

All these are really delightful I wish we could import them. We have H. minor and a little blue-leaved number called 'Dewdrop' (or 'Dewdrops') but I've not come across the others.

[mark smyth]

Why are they banned?

[mark smyth]

I've was asked to add names to the individual pictures of the Hosta gallery. It's done.
http://marksgardenplants.com/hostacomparison.htm

[Lesley Cox]

They are not banned Mark and I think at least one North Island nursery does import, mainly from the USA. But in the first place, all plants coming in must have a species name as well as the generic, and it must be pretty hard to trace these back to the original species by now. As well, plants must come from a nursery (not private) source, the nursery has to be inspected 6 months prior to export to NZ and cleared of an enormous list of pests, diseases etc and then there are all the pre-export requirements of inspection of bare-rooted plants, phyto certs, etc etc and further inspections and quarantine when they get here. The costs are astronomical, even if any nursery wanted to go through all those hassles just to export a few plants to NZ. Lets face it, we're not the biggest market in the world. So while we can still bring in many (not all) seeds) we just can't do plants.

[Lesley Cox]

You seem to have missed one Mark, the one immediately under 'Green with Envy.'
I used to have a lovely yellow dwarf called 'Kabitan' but recent drought years have sent it to Heaven. There are one or two others from your gallery here as well, like 'Alan P' McConnell' but I don't think that's REALLY very dwarf. ( I have it as Allen)

[mark smyth]

Thanks Lesley, the link has been fixed

In Plant Finder it has Allan P.

I could have sent you seeds from all my miniatures but I cut off all the seed heads

[TheOnionMan]

You seem to have missed one Mark, the one immediately under 'Green with Envy.'
I used to have a lovely yellow dwarf called 'Kabitan' but recent drought years have sent it to Heaven. There are one or two others from your gallery here as well, like 'Alan P' McConnell' but I don't think that's REALLY very dwarf. ( I have it as Allen)

For only a brief period, while a young fellow in my early twenties, I played around with Hosta hybridization, primarily interested in the dwarf ones.  One I was working with was Hosta 'Kabitan'.  Out of those brief efforts, I retain just one hybrid selection to this day, this is the original plant 34 years hence.  I never named it formerly, figuring there are already so dang many Hosta hybrids, after all, hosta and daylily hybridization is practically a national pastime here in the USA.  But I did nickname it for my wife, thus it is Hosta 'Sukey'.  I particularly like the undulate edges to the veined leaves and fountain like growth.

The hybrid is much bigger than the dwarf 'Kabitan'.  It is all lemon-gold in spring, holding that color all through spring and into summer.  But more than just gold, it actually has white blends in the leaves, giving it an ethereal appearance.  My older camera was better able to capture the lemon and white color (photo 1) taken later in the season (June) where the colors were lightening up, whereas the camera I now share with my daughter darkens the yellow color making it look a tad more intense than it really is (photos 2-5), these photos taken earlier when the color was indeed more intense.  In some years the color is stronger than in other years, and with our exceptionally early spring and warm temps, this Hosta was very bright this year... even my wife noticed it   She asked about the pretty yellow plant, and I told her (once again) that it was a Hosta that I named for her, and she was pleased.

The darker green Hosta on the left with upturned leaf tips is H. 'Bridegroom', and the dwarf gray-green cream-edged Hosta in the foreground is 'Little Wonder'.

[mark smyth]

very nice Mark.

Kabitan is one of the one on my wants list