Hello all, I am new here to Daves garden. I want to open a Nursury soon. My wife loves tropical hibiscus so I started collecting and propagating them to add to my other plant collection for our upcoming business. I tried to propagate and breed 3 we had planted in our yard with no success. After searching out and reading as much as possible we started to buy plants known as good breeders. I crossed Big Easy and Madame DuPont earlier this spring and got seeds, 3 sprouted and are 4-6” tall now. A few weeks ago several potted plants started blooming and I started breeding again and currently have 5 seed pods! I will post pics and names of crosses later. I also have some seedlings growing from Richard in Tahiti and some zeek crosses from Australia.
Tropical Hibiscus Hybrid breeding progress
Sweet Cheeks x Jolanda Gommer
I have a large seed pod on Sweet Cheeks
Seed pod on sweet cheeks
Hi Misties_Blossom,
Welcome to Dave's Garden. This Hybridizers forum has been rather slow of late. I breed zinnias purely as a hobby, so Tropical Hibiscus is "not my thing". However, oddly, I bought a "Bug Blaster" from Hidden Valley Hibiscus to use on my outdoor zinnias.
https://www.hiddenvalleynaturearts.com/acatalog/bugblaster.htm
Presumably the Bug Blaster is also useful on Hibiscus. I have gotten some novel flower forms in my zinnias by extensive hybrids of hybrids.
ZM (not associated with any product or vendor mentioned or linked)
They look great! I only grow perennials right now because I do not have a Nursury store, I still sell at my home. Hopefully I can get another property soon and then once open I will sell a greater variety of plants including annuals. I started breeding tropical hibiscus because my wife loves them. I tried to propagate a few and learned some are very hard to get cuttings to root, so I am currently trying to graft some. I then read most will root more easily if grown from seed. It is a long process, 2-3 months to set seed, and 6 months to 2 years to get first flowers, most should be good, some plain, and very few exceptional and worth propagating. Thank you for sharing your pics. I have no need for the blaster, some times I spray close with hose. I make my own white oil solutions with different plant oil extracts. Cinnamon, mints, orange, rosemary and more. I alternate these with pesticides, and try to use a different pesticide every spray.
Hi Misties_Blossom,
On the subject of difficult-to-root cuttings, have you tried some of the rooting hormones? I have had no trouble rooting cuttings of zinnias using them.
ZM
Yes I have. I use KIBA and NAA
I currently have 12-15 seed pods. Hopefully I can keep them warm enough over the next few months so that they ripen properly.
@Misties_Blossom Cool! Another Tropical Hibiscus hybridizer, nice to meet you all. I too am a tropical hibiscus lover and breeder. I am new to this too,only have been doing this one year but so far ended up with over 1200 seeds and 145 potted plants and propagated over 30 plants via stem cuttings. All of my seedlings still have not sprouted, so I'm excited. Let me know what kind of flowers you end up with, Misties!
The more seasoned garden assortments could satisfy 50 years and develop to levels of 0-15 feet or more, while a portion of the fresher mixtures have life expectancies of 5-0 years and just grow a couple inches a year.