North Hollywood, CA (Zone 9b) | October 2013 | positive
I too am waiting for my gardenia thunbergias to bloom. The plants themselves are very green and interesting. I collected one seed pod i...Read Moren 2004. Planted the seeds and was very impressed with how many seedlings grew. (more than 30) And each of the following two years new seedlings sprouted. I have only just recently planted some in the ground. I have most of them in pots. I've been giving them away for a few years. They do seem to grow nicely in both sun and shade and are drought tolerant. They vary in form, some are taller, some shorter, and the leaf size varies too.... update 7/19/2016: First blossom opened today. Bush has buds on most branch tips. So excited!
This is a very different type of Gardenia as I'm sure anyone who has seen it already knows. It is not at all free flowering like it's Gar...Read Moredenia augusta/jasminoides cousins. If you feel like waiting 3-4 years, it will probably start flowering for you in a once yearly impressive summer flush of fragrant blooms, more and more profusely as it grows.
By the way, if a person wants a lot of blooms from their Gardenia veetchi, Gardenia Mystery, beds - fertilize weekly and stand back. My customers are always blown away by the sheer volume of flowers. I tend to alternate between a soluble 20-20-20, and 9-9-9 (with iron chelates and sulphur). I suspect the key is a consistent feeding schedule.
I have one of these in my (San Diego, CA coastal area) backyard, next to our deck. It only blooms when the weather really warms up - say...Read More high 70's-80's and the humidity rises. It took it 5 years to produce a single beautiful flower. Now at 9 years, it blooms a lot, smells fabulous and is simply gorgeous when properly pruned. So glad I didn't 'edit' it out of the garden.
I have never grown this plant, but it is used as rootstock for other gardenias grown for the sandy soils of Florida. This root stock is ...Read Moreresistant to root knot nematodes which do in most gardenias on their own roots.
The fragrant flowers are large with long tubes and spreading petals. I have seen this plant blooming at Los Angeles Arboretum (next to t...Read Morehe waterfall) and at Quail Botanic Garden at the stairs behind the open lawn. The old Monrovia Growers grounds in Southern California had a standard shaped tree on the north side of the office house, but I never saw that one in bloom. South Coast Botanic Garden also has a plant with shrubby growth down to the ground. My favorite locations are at LAA and QBG as they are next to stairs and can be viewed from above and below.
I have seen one of these in a botanical garden several differnet times of the year, and yet to see it flower... but has bizarre, huge fru...Read Moreits (for a Gardenia) so it probably flowered before these formed.
I too am waiting for my gardenia thunbergias to bloom. The plants themselves are very green and interesting. I collected one seed pod i...Read More
This is a very different type of Gardenia as I'm sure anyone who has seen it already knows. It is not at all free flowering like it's Gar...Read More
I have one of these in my (San Diego, CA coastal area) backyard, next to our deck. It only blooms when the weather really warms up - say...Read More
I have never grown this plant, but it is used as rootstock for other gardenias grown for the sandy soils of Florida. This root stock is ...Read More
The fragrant flowers are large with long tubes and spreading petals. I have seen this plant blooming at Los Angeles Arboretum (next to t...Read More
I have seen one of these in a botanical garden several differnet times of the year, and yet to see it flower... but has bizarre, huge fru...Read More
Although this plant appears healthy, I have yet to have it bloom in the three years it has been in my garden.