I went to the local botanical gardens as they were having a plant sale with vendors from all over this weekend. I know I may have arrived a bit late in the day, but at 2pm on Sunday I saw a peach versicolor in bloom simply labeled Brug for 15 dollars or such and another Brugmansia on the other side simply labeled pink A.T. for 15 or such on the other side. I stood for a while looking at the pink A.T and I was tring to decide what A.T stood for. Could this be a named hybrid? Perhaps A stood for aurea and T stood for tom's. My wife shook me lightly and simply stated, A.T...Angel Trumpet. This left me devastated. Even in a Botanical garden full of plant enthusiasts not a single one of the Brugmansia were labeled as to what they were. Even the Brugmansia that were growing in the botanical gardens were not labeled as to what species or cultivars they were. Lets not even discuss the supposed Kava Kava I found. 15 dollars for a no plant without a name...and at a Botanical garden full of plant vendors and such....
Local Botanical Gardens..Kanapaha
that is just plain sad. btw, I think I like your wife hehehe!!!
Maybe you should put in for a job!!! I bet even your kids could make a big start with naming things!
Brugman, i meant to go and forgot. i bought a 4 foot brug at a yard sale for $5.00 she had bought at kanapaha, "soft orange", gotta be one i have but the pot would have cost $5.00, figured i'd get some quicker blooms. i have only seen one brug in one nursery in gainesville in two years, their manager called it datura (i know her)...told me she'd look it up. in the fall kanapaha's sale is free admission, have gotten some neat plants from them.
brugmansia..this happens at even the best of botanical gardens.If no one there has an active interest in brugs..they won't bother to try to identify them...I have seen this all over the country at botanical gardens.Actually there isn't an adequate book on identification of these plants.we need color posters with all the flowers and leaves on them for a comparision.Maybe something we need to do this summer. **HHMM!** scratching his head...LOL
With all the knowledge that we have in the people here, all the brug enthusiasts, I imagine that with some effort, you all could colaborate on a book. Each one of you can dedicate yourselves to one chapter one species, I know Eric is partial to (is it the candidas???) and God knows we have plenty of photos judging from what is posted here. And what about the wealth of information from Kyle and Monika? the endless experiments that Calla has done, egads.....if one were to print out all the threads in this forum, compile it - voila we have a rough draft, It would need some fine tuning and additions to be sure - but we have the experts amongst us, I would love to see a book with your names on it.
What better group than this one to take on this challenge?
with some collaboration amongst yourselves, and surely we would support you in any way we could (editing etc. is about the only thing I could help with..)
What I am saying is, we have here a group of people that have been hybridising, growing brugs, identifying and knows just about all there is to know about growing brugs, why not put your knowledge and experience into a book.
The enthusiasm alone would carry you far.
This would be your legacy.
There is such a lack of information from the so called experts out there, mislabeled brugs in nurseries and for pete's sake a botanical garden???
It seems there is a need out there, and maybe it is something that you might consider.
Well, I certainly plan on taking pictures of every single brug I have blooming this summer. Maybe we all could and create our own collective Identification file.
Liz, I know you too are one of our in house experts, I would imagine you have a wealth of knowledge tucked away, and I look forward to seeing your brugs. You have some of the red ones don't you??? you are in the enviable position of being able to grow them in the "other" vancouver......(I just got one - and am very excited)
I know that Tonny is hoping to clear up a lot of questions when he gets his site finished. btw, has anyone heard from him????????????????/
Tig, I have wrote him on the 20th to no avail and I was thinking of writing him again, but I don't think it will get answered if I write him today anymore than if I wrote him a week ago. I sure hope everything is alright with the old buzzard.
~I am in no way an expert. I, like everyone else here, have been soaking up (and printing) every bit of information from this forum since last spring. It has been my greatest resource.
It seems to me there was a cookbook thing happening awhile back - maybe we could do a brug book.
I have a feeling if we could all read Monika's books many of our questions would be answered. Perhaps we should be begging Monika for an english translation to her book? Of course I would love for how to book or phamphlet to be created that went over hybridizing Brugmansia and gave a few pointers to be created. I have even thought a few of us might like to see each and every flower from a single cross posted so as to see all of the variation within a single cross....I am not certain however that many people would appreciate the multitudes of flowers that would look very similar and or be able to determine the minor differences in calyx, etc...those things would require close ups of the individual flower. Hence, one could take 200 seedlings from a single cross and take close ups of different parts of the flower from different angles and one would still not satisfy some Brugmansia enthusiasts....Okay, I know I ramble...enough said.
you just wait til your inbox is filled with thousands of images of each and every single flower!! LOL!!
I think we should standardize the pic we take..like having only one flower angled towards camera a bit and use a few leaves and a black poster board for backdrop.One flower is all thats needed..Whtas everybody think?
so is it a go then?
will I be seeing your book on the bookshelves at exclusive garden shops???
Eclipse, I think that is a great idea.
I think we can all come up with black poster board - but should we also do it the way Preissel has it in his book - pictures only taken on the second day? We all know how they progressively change colour. We also need someone or a board who will tell us when we have it labelled wrong.
Do you think we could use the old Brug and Datura contest forum?
I like a side shot as it shows the overall shape of the flower and how the calxy forms on the corolla as well. Not to mention how the flower is positioned in the tree...ie a natural look.
http://www.monika-gottschalk.de/Galerie/rosalie.jpg
This message was edited Wednesday, Mar 27th 8:57 AM
LOL Eric - did you ask Monika if you could use her picture??? Seriously - I think her's are the best pictures I've seen.
Liz,
I must confess I did not....Monika not only makes great hybrids, she takes wonderful pictures. Have you seen the picture of Apricot Queen on Monika's website or Ocre? Almost forgot Esmeralda's. I love the shape of those 3 hybrids.
This message was edited Wednesday, Mar 27th 12:24 PM
Now that we are headed a certain direction on Brugs for identification...we can take better pics and more notes.Should be a banner year for the brug world. :-)