Oddest-name plant

Yesterday I harvested seeds from one of my green-manure plants. It started me thinking (oh no!)

Its common name is Hairy Vetch. When I first heard of it, I loved it! Sounds like something you have to go to the doctor for a cure, doesn't it? 'I have got to find a salve for this Hairy Vetch before it drives me crazy!'

What do you grow (or wish you did) with a weird name?

The winner gets a packet of my Hairy Vetch seeds!

Well Pigsqueak (Bergenia) has to rate an honorable mention. Honestly, why would you call a perfectly nice plant "pigsqueak"?

I have always been confused with the plant Adenophora confusa. I had been calling it something else for a while 'til someone corrected me.

Many years ago in Florida, I liked to point out the plant Chrysalidocarpus lutescens to others while driving the car. It just has that certain ring to it.

ok..here's one I grow........."Dornroschenschloss Sababurg"
.......now try not to bite your tongue!!!! E.

I think Obedient plant has an odd/misleading name. That plant is anything BUT obedient. I think a better name would be naughty plant. :)

My favorite is Bat Face (Cuphea llavea.) Although not that wierd a name, it is amazing how true to the name the flower is.

Ornithogalum dubium - a plant for those of us who can't make our minds up either!

Clitoria ternata, small vining shrub from india, blue flowers used to die rice.
aka butterfly pea.

really pretty plant.

Quite a number are unpublishable on a family site but here's a few from a couple of my wildflower books.

Sucklings, Sleeping Maggie - Trifolium pratense
Baa-Lambs, Quillet, White Sookies - Trifolium repens
Cut Finger, Hasty Roger - Scrophularia nodosa
Lawyers, Cat Chops - Rosa canina
Loving Andrew - Geranium pratense
Flesh and Blood - Potentilla erecta
Tittle my Fancy, Kiss Me Kitty Run in the Street - Viola tricolor
Naked Nannies, Underground Shepherd - Orchis mascula
One O'clock Popjacks - Stellaria
Nipper Nuts - Lathyrus montanus
(you have to be really careful saying this one) Tisty-tosty - Primula veris

There are loads more and (unlike the occasional botanical name) I haven't made a single one up!

I don't grow them on purpose, but you can sometimes find Dead Man's Fingers (mushrooms) growing in my yard!

Terry..........maybe cuz when the pigs eat 'em, they squeak!!

"eyes"

eyes, I dunno. Pigs squeak a lot, no matter what they eat!

Okay, how about "Welcome-home-husband-though-never-so-drunk" (no, I am NOT making it up - it's a legitimate name for Sedum; one source hypothesizes it might be an allusion to its purgative effects when consumed...)

Baa, are you sure you didn't make these names up.:) Tittle my Fancy, Kiss Me Kittle Run in the Street; definitely on my wish list.:)

ROFLOL @ golddog!!!

"eyes"

Terry

Here we call Sempervivums something similar, 'Welcome Home Husband, However Drunk you Be'

Golddog

Hand on heart! Another name for V. tricolor is 'Kiss Me Behind The Garden Hedge among a number of others, the book that came from is The Country Diary of Creating a Wild Flower Garden by Jonathan Andrews. Imagine going into the garden centre and asking for it by that name LOL!

This message was edited Wednesday, Jul 9th 4:13 PM

Most definitely, at this moment, looking for the above book. Good thread!

Laughing hard here, too!

There is a cultivar of Ornithaligum (sp) called 'Starry Eyes'. When increased through tissue culture, in the trade it is referred to as 'Blurry Eyes'.

Cyclamen: Sow bread. What was everyone feeding to their ovines? Bergenia and cyclamen! Pretty gourmet food there!

Come on! What else?

Are you sure you didn't mean porcines? *G*

Bears breeches

I gotta vote for "Love lies bleeding"
Amaranthus caudatus

Cheri'

Pig squeak is called that because if you rub a leaf between your fingers, it sounds like a piggie. Try it, you'll like it!

For me it's Mole Bean or Castor Bean. Ricinus communis.

What a funny thread. I really laughed, especially at Baa's list. I grow some of the plants listed. One that I grow is not really weird, it is just that when someone asks me what it is and I tell them it is Anisodontea hypomandarum, they look at me as if I lost my mine. Donna