Re: Datura HELP
- To: perennials@mallorn.com
- Subject: Re: Datura HELP
- From: D* S*
- Date: Fri, 23 Jun 2000 00:15:00 -0400
On Wed, 21 Jun 2000 12:45:42 -0400 Lowery@zeonchemicals.com writes:
> I've seen the datura that you mentioned about being hardy to zone 6.
> It
> has a white flower, no? Several homes in the neighborhood have them
> as
> shrubs around the yard. They are quite pretty with those huge
> flowers. It
> took me a while to figure what they were. I can't seem to keep the
> other
> showier varieties alive for some reason.
Val --
Yes, heavily fragrant white flowers 8" long and 6-8" across, opening in
the evening and staying open well into the morning. Foliage is
bluish/greyish-green with silver hairs. Mature plants can get 3'+ tall
and spread out over 5'. Does well in full to partial sun, even high
shade. The full name is actually D. inoxia subspecies quiquecuspida,
sometimes erroneously sold under the name D. meteloides which is actually
a synonym of D. inoxia subsp. inoxia.
If by "showier" you mean the ones with the double white, yellow, purple,
blue, red (etc.) flowers, those are almost all cultivars of D. metel
which prefers hot, full sun situations similar to their tomato and pepper
cousins. D. metel is an annual, so you'll want to let some -- repeat,
some! -- seed pods mature. I snip the seed pods off all my daturas --
unless I want seeds in which case I'll let ONE seed pod mature -- so that
the plants don't waste time producing billions of seeds and,
subsequently, I don't have to spend the following spring pulling up
billions of seedlings.
Dean Sliger
Warren, Michigan, USA
Zone 6B
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