Africanaussie

Hibiscus is the backbone of my tropical garden.   The poodle hibiscus is a special one that I love.  I bought one years ago with my daughter, and now we are separated by many miles of ocean, so it brings  a happy skip to my heart whenever I see these flowers.  This is such a gentle salmon pink colour.  The red hibiscus slowly unfurls, and then the flower only lasts a day or two, but there are always lots of flowers in bloom at any one time. they like lots of sun, I just love how the sunlight is filtering through the delicate petals here. they are certainly hardier than they look here.  perhaps my favourite is the variegated hibiscus - the red flowers stand out so magnificently against the snowy white leaves. They don't require any special care in my garden, other than a good pruning every now and then so that they don't get leggy.  Thank heavens for plants like hibiscus as I haven't been doing much gardening lately and yet they carry on...

Years ago when my non gardening youngest daughter was living with me in Florida USA, we bought a hibiscus together.  I don't know if that was its official name but we called it poodle hibiscus.   She has always requested that I try to grow that beautiful flower again. I live in Australia  now and she in New York, so I love to find connections that reduce the miles between us.  Over the weekend this bloomed :  I must have at some stage found one and taken  a cutting.   I nurtured that little slip not really remembering which one it was.  I e-mailed my daughter, and she confirmed it was just like the first poodle hibiscus we grew together.  Don't you love those delicate red veins running through the petals? the lower "tail" part looks so lush and full, yet delicate, and what a gorgeous salmon color. My daughter is at the moment...