Solved Mysterious Tree!. . . Well, I assume it's a tree!

Hello everyone,

I have had my own garden for nearly two years now, and I am starting to be able to identify stuff .

However, a mysterious tree has appeared and I have no idea what it is.

Can anyone enlighten me?

You might notice that it is next to a stump of the tree that was there previously. Could it be another of those? We did not know what the previous tree was either to be honest, but it was extremely old and was starting to fall down. It flowered very rarely, but when it did it was beautiful purple, but I know it wasn't lilac!

Tone

 

That looks to me like a Hibiscus. Could well be a sucker from the stump, the description fits.

 

I think you could be right. I've had a little look at some of the photographs on the internet, the leaves look very similar and the flowers also looks similar. It is nice really, we were not happy about chopping the old tree down, but it was really starting to suffer. There was more moss than flowers and it was leaning perilously!

 

Welcome to Gardeners Corner

 

Hi Zigs, Thanks for the welcome.

I've already benefitted from pearls of wisdom on this forum!

Tone

 

Bear in mind that Hibiscus only flower in late summer, so once it gets going, probably next year now, you wont see much in the way of flowers until Aug, next year.

 

I bought a small hibiscus plant last week (about 6" high) that had 2 buds on it. A few days ago one of the buds flowered but the flower only lasted about 1 -2 days before it started to shrivell up! I was attentive, re. watering it.

Also, apparently, they have to be kept indoors during winter. This all seems a lot of fuss for a small reward or am I missing something?

 

There are a few different kinds of Hibiscus.
The usual one which grows outside quite happily in the UK is H. syriacus.

There are other more tender types that are usually grown as house plants or more usually greenhouse plants.

 

A google image of H. syriacus reveals it to be either white, pale blue or pale pink. The one I have is deep red so I guess this needs bringing indoors in the winter. I did as the shopkeeper if it was an indoor plant or not...she seemed a bit undecided.

Is it normal for the opened flowers to have such a short duration - about 2 days - before shrivelling?

 

Yes Hibiscus flowers are not long lived.
They are formed prolifically on H. syriacus in August, so the plant does make a good show.