My First Seedling Bloomed Today

This is the first bloom on my first seedling. I planted the seeds last May, so its been about 15 months from seed to the first bloom.

Here's one more photo of the same bloom.

Jon

She's beautiful Jon! Congratulations! Who are her parents?

Is this something you cross pollinated, Jon? The colors in this bloom are fantastic. Hope everyone enlarges the pic so they can appreciate the color variations in this bloom. Just gorgeous. Congratulations on a real beauty.

Judy

Jon, it's absolutely outstandingly gorgeous, I imagine that you are very proud and exited with it, especially since it's your very first seedling, and have such luck of it being perfect after waiting 15 months, just to let you know I want to be the first in line when it comes time for you to trim, cuttings that is, please. Now come the hard part, what name to give to such a gorgeous bloom, hope you get more beauties like this one from your other seedling.

CONGRATULATION! Jon, you deserve it.

Wilfred

Yes Judy, it's a cross pollination of Tigerama X Something. I just don't recall which one it was. I did 4 crosses with Tigerama and only one set seed. I had marked them with a post it at that time and the post its fell off in a week or two. Oh well, you live and learn. Here's another photo of it mid afternoon.
Jon

I'm trying to think about a name, but gonna wait until the other 4 buds open up to see what they look like.

Nice flower Jon, you did good. I like the dark center. Any more from that cross that hasn't bloomed yet? :~)

Dave

Be sure & post the other flowers when they bloom. I think you should call it "Jon's Rainbow". Is this your 1st cross? I tried to do it about 10 days ago but the buds fell off. Then, I read it is best to have 60-80 F so I will try again in Nov. or whenever it cools down. And, I was real scientific when I did it. Tied a small piece of lace on the stem & took pictures, emailed them to myself saying what I crossed. The next day I tried it again & used a tiny pink ribbon on those. So, I have my tiny lace & ribbons to use when it gets cool enough to try it again. I'm so proud of you & for you!!!

Judy

No, there were 4 seeds and that's the only one that grew. Even this one didn't look all that great until this spring. It was such a slow grower and then took off this spring and the foliage began to improve in color. Yes, it's my first cross Judy. I did it last spring just to give it a try since I had read about crossing them. I did a second cross this spring and that seedling is growing right now. At least I know the exact parents of the second cross. You think that you will remember but you forget if you don't write it down.

You mean the seed pods only have 4 seeds?
Judy

That's all that were in that pod when it fell off the plant. There may have been more that fell out when it dropped. My second pod from this spring had 6 seeds.

Good job Jon. What unusual color variations on your flower. Look forward to seeing the other flowers when they bloom so do post pictures so we can compare and see if they look like the first one.

(Only one more day and it's back to work officially. Boo Hoo Hoo)

Hi Jon

Your seedling looks great, the color kind of reminds me of Pocahontas or Cinnamon Girl. If you had to wait 15 months for your first bloom I wonder how long we will have to wait in our weather, it's just been 8 months since our first set of seeds we planted and a couple of them are taller than some liners we bought earlier in the year. By the way we had one seed pod that had only 2 seeds another that had 11 seeds and 2 more that only had 4 seeds.


Patrick

Hi Patrick

The comparison to Pocahontas definitely went through my mind also this morning. The bloom size is very similar also. Pocahontas has this one beat though when it comes to bloom form. This bloom faces outward and Pocahontas always has those perfect upward facing blooms.

Hi guys I'm a new kid on this block! I have recently started growing hibiscus and found this thread most
interesting. Jon that's a real nice one! Interesting 15 months from seed to flower, spooky I was just wondering
about this very thing only yesterday!

Another

Jon

Patty, do you work for a school district or is your vacation just ending? At least we will have long evenings & you can still play in the dirt.

Patrick, I did not realize that there were so few seeds in the pods. Wonder if 11 is some sort of record? There is sure a lot more work to this than people realize. Have to be a labor of love!

Anxious to see the next blooms, Jon.

Judy

Pretty pink flower, other Jon. Welcome to the learning center. I learn more on here than I do from watching Jeopardy!

Judy

Wow, three Jon's (not John's) on this forum. This might get confusing. Welcome Pajonica. Can you get hibiscus locally or are you getting yours off the internet?

Hi guys, thanks for the welcome! guamsorbit I can buy them locally no problem.

I can't think of too many interesting names for the seedling. The only name I've come up with so far, that I kind of like is Hibiscus "Toucan Tango"

Jon

That's a great name for the seedling Jon! I like the play on words. It is so...you ;-)

LOL. Thanks Dee. The play on words is definitely moi.

Hi Judy,

I don't think 11 seeds is a record, I have a photo somewhere if I can find it of a woman in Europe that had 46 seeds, and Richard Johnson from Tahiti has corresponded that he has had over 20 seeds. I am a member of the yahoo groups for international hibiscus society and there are a lot of hybridizers on there that share a lot of great information.

Patrick

Hopefully you can get into a second category at the next show...best new seedling?

He he I like it! LOL

LOL. I'm not sure Dee. I'll have to ask if "amateurs" are allowed to enter seedlings. The hardest part is getting that plant to bloom on the day of a show. There are only two shows a year here locally. I guess the way to improve your chances would be to take some cuttings and reproduce a few more plants???

Yes, and if by chance some of that wood made its way to Puerto Rico (cuz Wilfred asked first) and California then we could make her famous!

When you are getting ready for a show, do you pick the blooms before they are open all the way and then wait till right before the judging to see which one is suitable for showing? I've seen pictures where they look all curled up still.

Much of it depends on how far you have to travel to get to the show that morning. I've only entered the show in West Palm Beach and can get there in about 50 minutes. Some will enter blooms in many different shows and will travel several hours to get there. If you're travelling several hours and the cutoff time for entering blooms is 11AM that makes it practically impossible to be able to pick a bloom that same morning. The bloom has to be open at least 1/4-1/3 of the way before you pick it. The best option is to pick your best blooms the day before a show and keep them refrigerated. Most blooms will stay open and extra day if they are refrigerated. Most shows are held during the cooler months of Feb, Mar, April when your blooms tend to stay open longer on their own. If you see a curled up bloom in a show it probably means it was picked to early or it was picked the day before and just decided it couldn't stay open as long as you were hoping for. I picked 7 blooms for the Saturday show in April and took them all with me. Most of them were picked on Friday. When I looked at them Saturday morning I decided to only enter 4 of them. The other three I thought were either small in size for that particular cultivator or were already beginning to close that morning.
Jon

Judy I am a school teacher; first official day is Thursday but I am in my classroom working today; got a new teacher computer and I'm trying to get it all set up. Plus I teach keyboarding so I had to set up my lab and make sure all the student computers were working. I've been filling out tech work orders this morning so that the tech guys will get some stuff done before school starts.

Jon--I love the name you picked out. Very creative!

Jon, the name is perfect for it, I usually look at the bloom and pick what ever name comes to mind at that moment, whether its a person, place or thing or color, I think you hit it on the spot with the name, its just you all the way, great name for it. hope you get to enter it in a contest and win.

Wilfred

I like your name, Jon. Hope you can enter it in competition. Anxious to see the other blooms. You did so well with your first time entry. Nice hearing about what you go through just to enter competition. Wondered about that.

Patrick, I signed up with the IHS recently. There are beautiful blooms from all over the world & I'm learning a lot from the people there. It is kind of mind boggling to see all of the new varieties. Makes you realize that you can never have them all as there are new ones everyday. This hobby will never be boring! Wow, 46 seeds! I'd be thrilled to get 2. Or 1 that would germinate.

Patty, I think what you are teaching is wonderful. My GS is a whiz & I call him with my problems & he KNOWS how to fix it for me.
Judy

Congrats Jon..... Looks Great...