Or some of them
'Captain Starlight'
My Regal Pelargoiums
I can't read the name tag on this one...and no, it is not my writing!
'Honeywood Lindy'
and this one
lovin' that Honeywood. even the name is neat.
Lovely! Are they new?
I think the first of the unknowns is Pelargonium 'Aldebaron'.
http://www.geraniaceae.com/bin/detail.cgi?id=470
The second is Pelargonium 'April Showers'.
http://www.geraniaceae.com/bin/detail.cgi?id=476
This message was edited May 11, 2009 8:41 PM
I have had them since the end of March...there was a co-op and I got them through that.
I feel an itchin' for more geraniums coming on . . .
Did you get them through geraniaceae?
Yes, that is the place!
This is 'Old Orchard'
Those are all so pretty. I have never seen some of those before. Look what I found at Trader Joe's yesterday...
a Martha Washington Geranium. It thought they were cool looking because they look like pansies.
I picked up one very similar to the photo of Martha Washington--betting that's it. I work at a walmart and it was huge and only $10 so I snapped it up--need to get another one. Wish it had been identified but it's gorgeous:)
This type isn't winter hardy is it? Should I take cuttings or bring it inside before first frost?
In California we called the Martha Washingtons...'Pansy Faced Pelargoniums' and no, they are not hardy..take some cuttings and bring them in before frost.
My mom grew them every summer in Connecticut when I was a kid but I hadn't really seen them anywhere (local nurseries in NM or NC) so I had debated buying them online.
Thank you for the info on how to do the cuttings in fall. Will attempt that as it is such a pretty plant.
I checked the spelling -- it would be named "Aldebaran," the name of a distant, giant star.
Sharon
Mine did not survive the winter, even in the garage. :(
I have NO idea why, but Regal Geraniums do NOT work for me. I think poor Martha (Washington) takes one look at me and decides for suicide. They are pretty, but in my little domain, I have to look athem as rooted cut flowers!
Sharon
I bought me some NEW Martha Washington this year. I just love them. They are so pretty! If any of you have advise on how to care for them, please let me know. I read that they do not like the summer and wondered if I should try to plant them in the shades.
Honeywood Lindy is not Honeywood Lindy. In the 1980s (maybe 1990s) I got Honeywood Lindy from Young's Mesa Nursery (long gone). It is a standard-sized regal (Martha Washington) with white petals with a dark lavender spot in the center of each. This one is one of the smaller-flowered types that fit in the general category of angels (when I started collecting in earnest in the 1970s the angels were limited to ones done by a particular English hobby hybridizer (can't remember his name) in the first third of the 20th century using a regal and P. crispum as parents). I just checked, and don't have a photo of Honeywood Lindy. If I run across one (I think I got a plant at the San Diego Geranium Society's annual sale in May, but it will have to bloom-out for me to be sure) I'll post it.
This one fits the pattern of what were called pansy-faced in Helen Van Pelt Wilson's Joy of Geraniums, which was a group of smaller-flowered regal types with the two uppers darker, the lower three lighter, like some pansies of the time. It is impossible to know exactly what it is--there are hundreds of angel types now, and lots of them look like this one.
Regals often don't work for folks who have to overwinter them in a greenhouse or in the house because they need to have night temperatures in the 40s in the winter/early spring to set the flower buds, and a heated greenhouse is often too warm, and a home is surely too warm. If you have a place you can keep them at a minimum 35°F and no warmer than 50°F at night you should be able to have them bloom.
Another problem is pruning. Spring pruning in anticipation of the year's growth cuts off all the flower buds that initiate during the winter. Best pruning for regals and spring-flowering scented-leaf is to cut each tip back to 3 good leaves around Labor Day. By Thanksgiving you will see a lot of new growth at the base of the plant. At that time you can cut the long rambly-scrambly stems back to the new growth. To cut the plant way back all at once often kills it, but the two-part pruning pretty much eliminates that. By having the plant cut back late November/early December means all the new growth (there's lots thru the winter if it's well-lit and cool) will be packed with flower buds come spring bloom time.