{"id":2486,"date":"2018-08-13T05:14:38","date_gmt":"2018-08-13T13:14:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/?p=2486"},"modified":"2018-08-13T05:14:38","modified_gmt":"2018-08-13T13:14:38","slug":"blue-glorybower-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/blue-glorybower-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Blue Glorybower"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Blue<\/a>
Blue glorybower: A flock of blue butterflies captured on the branches of a shrub.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I admit to a love\/hate relationship with houseplants and I don\u2019t need a psychologist to explain it.\u00a0 My deep-seated ambivalence stems from the fact that most of my houseplants are tropicals or tender plants that only cohabit with me during the cold weather months.\u00a0 When night temperatures are above 50 degrees Fahrenheit, they lounge on the porch or fill \u201choles\u201d in the beds and borders.\u00a0 When the weather is sunny, they bloom like crazy and produce an abundance of shoots and leaves.<\/p>\n

And then they come inside.<\/p>\n

Like humans, most plants tend to slow down or even go completely dormant in winter.\u00a0 Generally, indoor gardeners cut out routine feedings and limit watering during this time.\u00a0 Depending on the species and variety, the plants may lose leaves or just sit there looking forlorn.\u00a0 For those of us who like signs of growth, fresh green leaves and, above all, flowers, the whole winter thing can be depressing.<\/p>\n

This is why I always think twice about investing in tropicals.\u00a0 My daughter, however, is not bound by those scruples.\u00a0 This is probably because she is only a sporadic tender of houseplants and never feels guilty about it.\u00a0 I on the other hand, see chlorosis, or yellowing leaves, and start feeling guilty immediately.\u00a0 Maybe it is the maternal instinct at work.<\/p>\n

My daughter is responsible for bringing blue glorybower, sometimes known as blue butterfly bush, into my life.\u00a0 She saw it across a crowded room at a local nursery and immediately heard music, glimpsed a flutter of angels overhead and nearly swooned over its beauty.\u00a0 She has not been this smitten this quickly since the first episode of the TV series Outlander.<\/em><\/p>\n

The object of this love-at-first-sight experience was a shrubby plant, about three feet tall, including its container.\u00a0 Its sturdy stems were adorned with opposed pairs of elliptical green leaves and covered with clusters of blue, butterfly-like flowers.\u00a0 In fact, the shrub in full bloom looked like a large flock of small butterflies about to take off.\u00a0 It was gorgeous.<\/p>\n

\"blue<\/a><\/p>\n

A closer inspection revealed that the \u201cbutterflies\u201d were actually five-petaled flowers, each about one inch wide.\u00a0 The four main \u201cwings\u201d were petals of palest blue that contrasted with a fifth, elongated petal in a darker shade that had just a hint of purple.\u00a0 Long, prominent, curving stamens added to the sense of movement.<\/p>\n

All my reservations about overwintering tropical plants flew out the window.\u00a0 We grabbed the blue glorybower–formerly known as Clerodendron ugandense, and now going by the long, Latin moniker, Rotheca myricoides \u2018Ugandense\u2019—and moved on in search of other ways to max out our garden spending allowance.<\/p>\n

Clerodendron, former generic home of blue glorybower, is a large\u2014around 400 species\u2014group of shrubs and trees, mostly native to the tropics.\u00a0 The species within it, including blue glorybower, used to be classified as part of the Verbena family, but have now moved on to the enormous mint or Lamiaceae clan.\u00a0 The association makes sense when you look at the stems, which are square in cross section; and the evergreen leaves, which are paired on the stems and exude a pungent aroma when rubbed or crushed.\u00a0 Some of its relatives are popular ornamentals, including the red-and-white-flowered glorybower, or bleeding heart vine, and the orange-red-flowered flaming glorybower vine.<\/p>\n

In keeping with its Latin species\/varietal name, \u201cugandense\u201d, the blue glorybower is native to Uganda and Kenya in East Africa.\u00a0 Left to its own devices and grown outdoors year-round, it might reach ten feet or more in height.\u00a0 Fortunately, it blooms on new wood, so it can be pruned to keep it to a reasonable size.\u00a0 Like most flowering plants, it appreciates receiving those haircuts right after the petals fall.<\/p>\n

Our new blue glorybower is luxuriating on the sunny back porch, after a spell in the lower back garden during our recent house painting adventure.\u00a0 Since we acquired it over the Memorial Day weekend, it has had three distinct flushes of bloom, each larger than the last.\u00a0 The blooms are succeeded by small, green, berry-like fruits, but I clip those off as part of the pruning ritual.\u00a0 The flowers are not fragrant, but it really does not matter because they are so beautiful.\u00a0 When the petals are spent, they drop off cleanly, leaving a scattering of blue confetti on the porch planks.<\/p>\n

The garden information sources tell me that I can expect my glorybower to have the usual less-than-glorious spell after it comes inside for the winter.\u00a0 However, anything that blooms in profusion three times in nine weeks will have earned its rest by October or so.\u00a0 I will try to remember that when the plants and I are all suffering from Seasonal Affective Disorder in January.<\/p>\n

Local nurseries and garden centers sometimes carry blue glorybower, but you can also get a small\u20144-inch\u2014starter pot on Amazon.\u00a0 Rest assured that it will grow fast\u2014except possibly in winter.\"Blue<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I admit to a love\/hate relationship with houseplants and I don\u2019t need a psychologist to explain it.\u00a0 My deep-seated ambivalence stems from the fact that most of my houseplants are tropicals or tender plants that only cohabit with me during the cold weather months.\u00a0 When night temperatures are above 50 degrees Fahrenheit, they lounge on … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6,2,3,5],"tags":[1924,1923,1400,1929,1925,274,1927,1928,1926,499],"class_list":["post-2486","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fall","category-general-interest","category-spring","category-summer","category-winter","tag-blue-butterflybush","tag-blue-glorybower","tag-blue-flowered-plants","tag-clerodendron-family","tag-clerodendron-ugandense","tag-container-gardening","tag-east-african-plants","tag-flowering-houseplants","tag-rotheca-myricoides-ugandense","tag-tropical-plants"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2486","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2486"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2486\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2491,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2486\/revisions\/2491"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2486"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2486"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2486"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}