Faded glory
Burnt by the frost and cold but unbowed, the Camellia japonica, Springs Promise still looks great! Actually I sort of prefer the flower in this state as the actual bloom is a bit gaudy.
Sorry for the previous blurry photos. I was shaking from the cold and the wind was shaking the flowers. Despite the camera having IS image stabilization the handheld photos came out blurry. So I used a tripod and self timer to take another set of photos.
posted by Ki at
6:00 AM
9 Comments:
I am unfamiliar with the camellias... nobody seems to grow them here. Are the fresh blooms some kind of bright fuschia? I love the color of these--their paperiness reminds me of abutillon.
It does look quite lovely, Ki. My camellia is a really doubled deep rose, and the petals didn't dry so beautifully. Yours still have a flower shape, but mine were slimy blobs.
Pam in South Carolina has some of the most beautiful Camellias I've ever seen if you're not afraid of rampant Camellia lust!!
http://talesfromthelaboratory.typepad.com/tales_from_the_microbial_/2007/01/a_mornings_proc.html
They were too tender for Illinois, Kim -zone 7 perhaps?
Annie at the Transplantablel Rose
Kim,
Camellias aren't like a fuschia at all. The flowers are much larger and it can become a substantial woody shrub or eve small tree. Camellias are really hardy only to zone 7 as Annie mentioned. I'm pushing it by planting in zone 6b but according to Arbor Day I'm actually in zone 7 now so I was prescient in planting two of them;) The flower petals of the C. japonica are probably thicker than abutillon.
Annie,
In previous years the flowers did turn to mush. The conditions were just right to dry out the flowers after the frost kill this year. So this was a fortunate occurrence.
Luckily the url you posted for Pam's camellia collection was incomplete so I couldn't get to the site and be tempted. Actually, I can barely grow the two that we have in the most sheltered spot in the yard and unfortunately there is no room left to plant anything there so I can look but not buy anymore. Rats!
Oh, Ki - be brave! I'm not really supposed to grow camellias either, and I still look at lilacs and tulips:)
I think Kim meant the color fuchsia, not the plant?
Pam in SC is in my sidebar links - she has a white one up today called 'Sea Foam' that had me croonin'...
Here's the main page, I hope!
http://talesfromthelaboratory.typepad.com/tales_from_the_microbial_/
Annie at the Transplantable Rose
Annie,
It's fun to push the envelope but I feel guilty sometimes that I'm putting the plants through a lot of stress. :(
I always wanted a white camellia and I'll agree 'Sea Foam' is up there with the best. I do like to see the central boss of stamens/pistils though so I would buy one of those liek 'Siver Waves'
http://images.google.com/imgres?
imgurl=http://www.camelliagrove.com
.au/images/japonicas/j_silver_waves
_t.jpg&imgrefurl=http://
www.camelliagrove.com.au/
index-developed.asp&h
=98&w=100&sz=2&hl=en&start=
10&tbnid=gt9gVnOR6K96lM:&tbnh
=80&tbnw=82&prev=/images%3Fq%3D
camellia%2Bsilver%2Bwaves%26svnum%3
D10%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG
if I had any more space.
The comments writing area cuts off long urls unless you include only what you see then hit enter for the next line and on, so I wasn't able to use your link as it was displayed. I cut the link to: http://talesfromthelaboratory.typepad.com/ and was able to get to Pam's wonderful website. Thanks for the heads up.
Ki - the Silver Waves is lovely, reminding me of some of the single peonies I used to own and love; I've known peonies since I was a child, but never saw a Camellia in flower until a few years ago - guess that's why Camellia blossoms always get unfair comparison to Peonies!
When I pasted your long url it automatically shrunk to the main page of the website - but I knew enough to search for 'Silver Waves'. And now I know something about doing the enter thing on long addresses, so thank you!
Annie at the Transplantable Rose
Annie,
For some reason I have never thought about comparing Camellias with Peonies. It may be that they bloom at opposite times of the year and the wood peony that we have is white with a red base and yellow stamens/pistils and the camellias a dark pink.
You are right about peonies, they are much larger and come in shapes and colors not seen in Camellias though Camellias bloom for a longer period of time. 'Winters Surprise' was blooming in November and though most of the flowers are brown, even now there are still a few buds that were untouched by the frost, ready for the next bout of warm weather.
So what else can compare with peonies? I think the large poppies or an "Edith Bogue" magnolia could contend for the title.
Putting urls in this comment box is unreliable. I wonder if there is a better way to do it. I guess it's prob. best to do what you did, just do a search. Hope the loquat survived.
My husband has some pink camelias which survived the cold blast here in California. The hydrangeas didn't. ...And they are planted right next to each other. Go figure.
earlysnowdrop,
Hydrangeas die back pretty quickly here too. The first sign of frost and the leaves are all wilted and starting to brown. For some reason the three H. macrophylla we grew would only produce leaves and new vegetative growth and no flowers. They grew vigorously too crowding out other plants so I had to dig them all out. I didn't like the look of just dense foliage with no flowers. For some reason the H. paniculata doesn't do that and is covered with flowers so we've kept the plant even though it grows much taller than the H. macrophyllas.
Thanks for stopping by.
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