Rhododendron, Deciduous Azalea 'Admiral Semmes'

I have two of these. They bloom early in the season here in north central KY and I have not had any issues with disease or fungus. These ...Read Moreget morning sun and afternoon shade and bloom profusely. I actually like the bloom of the parent better than this cross. I have two Florida Flames, one of the parents, and they produce yellow white blooms with a touch of pink in them. Noteworthy that this plant was in bloom when we experienced 32 degrees night time temps but the shrub didn’t show any effects from the cold.

We bought 8 of these about 7 years ago. They were rather thin & did not seem to do well, but bloomed nicely every spring. I believe the...Read Morey got way too much summer sun, but we only lost one, & they now are getting better shade as all the oak trees are finally big enough to shade them in the summer. They look beautiful right now (mid March) with the yellow blooms, nice leaves come later. No trouble with fungus, really we mostly ignore them now that they are established. Will give them some azalea food after the blooming. We live near Poplarville, MS.

I was given one in late 2011 by the Crosby Arboretum in Mississippi. (I've never seen them anywhere else.) Despite its constant fungal ...Read Moreleaf problems, I always persisted in keeping it. I live in SE Louisiana, which is the perfect habitat for this plant, and I kept mine in dappled shade (of a live oak), as they like / require. Despite spraying it with copper octanoate several times a year, the leaf spotting just kept coming back and ravaging the plant. If you've ever tried to keep a fig tree around here, you'll know what I'm talking about when I say the leaves looked just plain BAD, meaning yellow, orange & brown amidst the green. Some nursery people to whom I've spoken agreed with me that this is just not a very good variety. Yesterday I decided to throw the plant away rather than put it in the ground and risk it infecting my other plants. (By the way, it barely grew in 3 years.) Having to spray a native plant for fungal problems is simply a deal-breaker for me. I want my plants, especially my native plants, to be bulletproof in our severe humidity / rainfall. It did send up a vigorous vertical water shoot this year, but I think that was from the rootstock, not the Admiral Semmes upper stock. It's very rare for me to give a negative rating (or even a neutral rating) on DG, but I feel this plant merits it.

The Admiral Semmes deciduous azalea is a cross between the Florida Pinkxster Azalea R. austrinum and an Exbury hybrid named Hotspur Yello...Read Morew. It is fragrant with nice almost yellow trusses.