Hi everyone! My name is Mike and I am addicted to plumeria!

Wow. Nice to see so many of my friends from MPG here! Thanks for directing me to this board Clare! I know I will enjoy it here. By way of introduction, I started the spring with two plumeria, one of which was the rooted branch of my main one that I broke off accidently. I now have about 40, including seedlings and rooting cuttings, and I am still looking to get more. I just got a Kauka Wilder (to replace the one I bought as a cutting that turned out to be a Nebel's Rainbow!), a Cobra, a Just Peachy, and a Singapore White. I am still looking for a Grapette because my wife loves the scent. I am not as experienced as a lot of people, but I will share what has worked for me and what hasn't when I see the opportunity.

Looking forward to meeting a lot of new plumeria people and reconnecting with some I already know. Here is a picture of my Nebel's Rainbow that was supposed to be a Kauka Wilder.

Mike

Welcome Fellow Plumeria addict. Looking forward to learning from you and sharing what we know. Glad 2 meetcha

JIM

Welcome to the site and great picture!!!

Kim

Hi Mike! It's great to see you here. I'm so very glad that you joined. It will be wonderful to chat with you here about plumies! I am so thrilled that my buddies from MPG are coming here. It's a very good thing:-)

I've seen Grapette offered by Hawaii Sandy on eBay, but it is usually not cheap. You could try emailing her to see if she will sell you one directly, but you are probably better off trying to win one on eBay because, if she agrees to sell you one directly, she will ask more than it usually sells for on eBay. You could also try calling Florida Colors to see if they have it. They have a lot of cultivars which they don't publicly announce.

Welcome, welcome, welcome to Dave's!

That Nebel's Rainbow is very pretty. Mine is blooming now too. I wish it had more of a fragrance, but it's a nice big meaty flower.

Hi...My name is Mike too and I am new also...I know nothing technical about Plumeria...but love them ...I have about 30 of my own.....established plants....rooted cuttings and of course seedlings.....I got my first own about 2 years ago from a neighbor...a common yellow and just cannot stop...its like a drug addiction!.....I love them all! I am looking forward to learning from you folks....I am soo happy to be here!

Hi Mike too! Welcome to Dave's! We are so happy you are here too. We all learn from each other here so don't be afraid to jump in with what works for you! Welcome!

Clare,
I thought of contacting Sandy directly, since she was the one who had the cutting on eBay, but I'll wait a bit. Recently, I just missed a cutting she had by about $1, and soon after I got an email from her with a second chance Buy-it-now for the same price I had bid for the same cultivar. Maybe she did it since I had purchased one directly from her previously. Maybe she will again. We'll see. Sandy's cuttings are so healthy and large with at least three tips. I got a Princess Victoria and a Hurricane from her recently, but I got the shipping fouled up so she couldn't combine the shipping. Instead, she sent me a second PV cutting with the order. Nice to deal with people like that.

I enjoyed your garden tour pictures. I print them out and show them to my plumeria to encourage them to grow faster!
Mike

Mike, I too got a second chance on an Angus Selection #3 that I got from her. Robert was the winner! It's pretty cool when that happens. I agree that Sandy's cuttings are wonderful, and she is a trustworthy seller. Everybody else must know that too because all her plumies are constantly being bid on while other sellers get no bids at all.

Thanks, and again, it's great to see you here!

Welcome Mike! ;)
Nice flower ya got there.
No loss, youll get a Kauka sooner or later anyway. ;)
Glad to see ya here!
Michael

Clare,
I think Sandy is psychic! I got a second chance from her this evening for a Grapette at the same price as my last bid, so I took it! I can't wait to get it started. My wife says that this is the last one I can get this year. (But she said that before and I'm still buying!!!)

Michael,
Nice to see you here as well. Is that a color break in your picture? What is the name of the plumeria? And, most importantly, where's the cat with the gun? I have some serious problems with a gopher here and I could sure use some help guarding the plumies!

Mike

Hi neighbor! Welcome to DG. Don't you just hate those gophers? I'm tryng to start my first plumies, and so far they just sit there looking at me, refusing to budge. I'm so impatient! Clare is my therapist. :-)

Kathleen

Cool, Mike! That's awesome! Grapette is supposed to smell like Grape Kool-aide. Good job! I laughed out loud when you said that your wife said that this is the last one you can get but that she said that before and you're still buying! I keep telling my husband that he is off the hook for birthdays, anniversarys, and Christmas because I bought the presents (plumies) to me from him already. LOL! About Michael's color break Celadine, he's been injecting his plants with viruses again! Michael, stop that!

LOL, Kathleen. I don't think I'm sane enough to be anyone's therapist! LOL! I'm getting impatient too and have just discovered that my Moragne #23, which I got last January, has no roots whatsoever. I'm tired of waiting for some of these cuttings to root also and will send Luc another batch to graft for me on Monday.

Hello Clare, another newbie question. I keep seeing you guys talking about Luc and grafting. What is it that Luc does for you. Is he graftinga particular variety to rootstock of some kind? Tanarae

Clare!!
You're stealing my thunder!! 8-o
The color break was induced by drawing latex from a Princess Victoria via hyperdermic and injecting it into the core of 1 branch of a celadine that was pushing an inflo.
What is most interesting about it is that there is now red in the celadines bloooms!
I will be crossing latex from several different plants to see what effect this has on blooms and if it repeats in subsequent inflos. ;)
Purdy aint she?
BTW the plant isnt mine lol!! Its Micahs.
The idear was mine, I offered instruction and lots of encouragement.
Mine will be next.
Im curious if the whole plant will be affected when an infected leaf falls to the soil.
The way we did this it should remain only in the injected branch.
Glad you like it. ;)

~~~Waving hello and welcome Dave's Garden, and the plumeria forum. Enjoy!
Patti

Hi Mike, so sorry to steal your thunder, dear. Thunder away! Once a plant has a virus, the whole plant has the virus so other branches will show the same thing. I hope Micah is protecting his other plants around this one so that his whole collection doesn't get the same virus.

I have heard of plants showing the break on only 1 branch.
Untill an infected leaf falls into the soil.
The branch that was infected hangs over the pots edge so it may never do that.
This is a test of sorts to define the truth of that 'rumor'
I shall be infecting 2 branches on one of my multi tipped Celadines.
Also a few nondescript seedlings if the flowers are unimpressive.
Im also experimenting to see if 'color' can be added via latex injection, as you can see there is now red in that celadine.
I am always doing some sort of Frankensperiment.
Ill only pick on the most common plumies. ;)

Michael,
It would be interesting to do that same experiment using latex from a cultivar that doesn't show a color break. If a color break occurs, will you be able to predict the color change in a white bloom by selecting the donor plant based on its normal bloom color? If a color break doesn't occur, is the color of the bloom affected in some other way, such as a noticeable change in hue? Since I have so few plumies, I am reluctant to start injecting mine.
Mike

Michael, with other viruses in other plants/vines, you can't keep it isolated to one branch. Eventually, it will affect every cell of the plant/vine, but I don't know how the virus travels -- through the cells of the plant or through the sap -- and I don't know how quickly the virus can spread. I just know that, when my Passiflora was showing a virus, I was tempted to cut it way back and let it grow back normally because new growth didn't look deformed, but my research indicated that there is no way to isolate the virus and, if part of the plant is infected, the whole plant is infected. This particular virus was the Cucumber Mosaic Virus. Perhaps Frangipani Mosaic Virus is different.

I forget the name of the virulin that causes the color break.
If it does infect the whole plant I am not concerned, its a celadine and I have plenty of them.
I have no qualms with owning a CB celadine, its a nice look.
Time will tell about color changes.
This was only the first step in a series of experiments.
I havent heard of any Plumies dying from the CB virus, I do know it spreads if your not careful.
I dont believe it acts like other viruses in that I have heard of plants only showing it in certain branches.
Early stages here too much to observe as yet to be making a final judgement on the effects.
So far its gorgeous!

Michael,
It certainly is gorgeous. I look forward to hearing/seeing what your experiments produce. Verrry interesting. (Using my best Arte Johnson voice.)

Mike

Hi Mike, I am also new here, too.

Michael, this is an interesting experiment on Plumeria virus and color break. How far from the tip to the part that was injected? And how long did you notice the first color break on the info after injecting? It is very interesting to see how fast the virus travels from the injected branch to other branches and to the rest of the plant. Thanks for sharing your findings.

Kukiat

Good morning Tanarae. Luc and his wife Carol own Florida Colors nursery. The following information is posted on their website:

PLUMERIA CUTTINGS versus GRAFTINGS

Florida Colors Nursery ( FCN) supplies freshly harvested cuttings of most varieties grown at the nursery. New varieties and those producing short canes between flowers are only available as grafted plants.

Grafted plants are produced by attaching a piece of a given plumeria variety to a two year old seedling root stock. The plants so produced are shipped with a full set of leaves, and abundant root system and very often with flower buds present present.

The purchase of grafted plants is the best way to obtain plumeria that will probably flower this year. The process of grafting has no ill effect on the performance of these plants. Seedling plants always produce a superior root system.

For any further questions either call us a Florida Colors Nursery (800) 527-8308, FAX (305) 258-6317 or write to us at 23740 SW 147 Ave., Homestead, Fl 33032 or e-mail us at FloridaColors@att.net.

When people purchase cuttings that they're having difficulty rooting, they sometimes contact Luc and arrange to send him the cuttings so that he can graft them.

Veronica :-)

Tanarae, I'm sorry that I missed your post earlier. I didn't see it until I just now read Delecie's post. She is right that Luc and Carol are two super nice people who own Florida Colors. You can buy grafted plants from them or cuttings. She is also right that Luc will graft any cutting that you send him for $4 each. Since it is getting late in the summer and since we've had a surprising lack of heat here, I have elected to send Luc 33 of my cuttings. Some are very precious to me, and I don't want to risk losing them during the rooting process. Also, some cuttings have a reputation of being difficult to root. Some of these cuttings include Plumeria species, Rainbows, and Reds. Getting these hard-to-root plumerias grafted ensures their survival. There are some plumerias that Florida Colors will only sell as grafted plumerias because they know they are difficult to root.

I posted this on Kukiats thread also
Here she is opened up. ;)
A lovely red streaked Celadine!