Re: Michauxia tchihatchewii!



On Thu, 6 Jul 2000, Nan Sterman wrote:

> >
> 
> That has to be one of the most amazing plant names I've ever seen! 
> How do you pronounce it?  What does it look like?
> 
Conventions of botanical Latin are contradictory where you have a
patronymic name in the genus or species, but the
usual practice is to approach the correct pronunciation of
the name in the original language. 

I have an impossible time getting my accent correct in both French and
Russian,

but I say:  mee-SHOW-see-ah tuh-hat-CHEW-ee-i

The irrepressible Denver horticulturalist, Panayoti Kelaidis, has
memorably referred to this plant as "The cat sneezed thrice..."

THis is a campanula relative native to central Asia.  It is biennial with
a first-year rosette of rough-hairy leaves, then bursting into a 4-6 foot
spire with just extraordinary flowers: about 4 inches in diameter,
with a pinwheel of about 20 white petals surrounding a huge snout-like
pistil-and-stamen affair. There are maybe 15-20 flowers on a stalk,
openning in succession over a couple of months.

I have a colony planted on a bank near my driveway that the neighbors
refer to as the "Dr. Seuss plants.."


loren russell, corvallis, oregon
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