{"id":3095,"date":"2020-06-15T05:19:40","date_gmt":"2020-06-15T13:19:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/?p=3095"},"modified":"2020-06-15T05:19:40","modified_gmt":"2020-06-15T13:19:40","slug":"duchess-of-edinburgh","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/duchess-of-edinburgh\/","title":{"rendered":"Duchess of Edinburgh"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"duchess<\/a>I frequently tell people that my garden speaks and sometimes even sings to me.\u00a0 What I don\u2019t say is that the voices are in many different languages.\u00a0 Any given plant might have ancestry going back to one or more species native to Asia, Africa or one of the world\u2019s many other cradles of botanical diversity.\u00a0 Seeds or cuttings of those ancestor species eventually made their way to Europe or America, where plant breeders worked with them to produce hybrid offspring.\u00a0 That hybridization process often involved many generations of crosses and recrosses, until those procedures produced the plants that we buy at garden centers today.<\/p>\n

\u2018Duchess of Edinburgh\u2019, a stupendous double white clematis that grows in my front garden, arrived on my doorstep by that route.\u00a0 A member of the buttercup or Ranunculaceae family, its ancestors were Chinese species like Clematis languinosa, white or lavender-flowered climber with compound leaves; or Clematis patens, also with violet to white flowers and pairs or trios of leaflets.\u00a0 In the nineteenth century, when plant hunters were returning from far-flung regions with hundreds of new plant species, those ancestor clematis arrived in western Europe.<\/p>\n

The first successful attempt to hybridize large-flowered clematis came in 1835, and the new hybrid was christened Clematis hendersonii, after the hybridizer, Mr. Henderson.\u00a0 \u2018Duchess of Edinburgh\u2019 owes its existence to George Jackman and his son, George Jackman II, who began their own clematis hybridizing efforts in 1858.\u00a0 Their efforts ultimately led to their first successful introduction, the showy Clematis \u2018Jackmanii\u2019.<\/p>\n

Still available and popular today, \u2018Jackmanii\u2019 boasts four or five-inch purple flowers with a faint pinkish-purple stripe in the middle of each rounded petal.\u00a0 It won a Royal Historical Society First Class Certificate in 1863.\u00a0 Perhaps equally important, it was the first in a successful line of large-flowered clematis.\u00a0 My \u2018Duchess of Edinburgh\u2019 was part of that line, introduced by the Jackman Nursery in 1875.<\/p>\n

At the time, it was common in the floral world to name especially lovely new plants after prominent people.\u00a0 In this case, the prominent person was the Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna, daughter of Tsar Alexander II of Russia.\u00a0 The Grand Duchess from Russia became the Duchess of Edinburgh when, in 1874, she married Alfred Ernest Albert, Duke of Edinburgh, and fourth son of the reigning English Queen, Victoria.<\/p>\n

The real-life Duchess looks rather haughty in pictures, but her namesake clematis is flat-out gorgeous.\u00a0 Borne on climbing stems adorned with foliage clusters consisting of three leaflets, the Duchess can scale trellises, tuteurs or other structures.\u00a0 In my garden, it is growing up through an old-fashioned white-flowered rose bush that blooms relatively late in the spring season.\u00a0 The clematis flowers open from fat, pale green buds, ultimately revealing five or six-inch flowers reminiscent of large, double chrysanthemums or even roses.\u00a0 They are fluffy, extravagant and pure white when fully open.<\/p>\n

\"duchess<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 If you are able to detach the flowers from the plant, the Duchess also makes a great cut flower and lasts fairly well in a vase.\u00a0 If left on the plant, the blooms eventually give way to pretty greenish seedheads.\u00a0 I generally let them develop, before banishing them when I cut the Duchess back by about one third after it blooms.<\/p>\n

I do that because it is good practice for large-flowered clematis, but also because \u2018Duchess of Edinburgh\u2019 has a trick up its sleeve that I like to encourage.\u00a0 Later in summer, the Duchess forms some additional buds.\u00a0 When they open, they are semi-double\u2014still gorgeous, but with fewer white petals.<\/p>\n

Horticulturists will tell you that this second flush of bloom happens because \u2018Duchess of Edinburgh\u2019 flowers on stems that developed last year\u2014\u201cold wood\u201d\u2014and stems that developed in the current growing season\u2014\u201cnew wood\u201d.\u00a0 Double flowers grow from old wood and semi-double ones on new wood.<\/p>\n

Most gardeners call \u2018Duchess of Edinburgh\u2019 a \u201ccompact climber\u201d, meaning that it rises no more than five or six feet.\u00a0 You won\u2019t have to invest in a 12-foot trellis to harness it, and it will even succeed in a large container.\u00a0 The stems twine, so the plants don\u2019t need a lot of tying and fussing to help the stems soar towards the heavens.\u00a0 Its only real cultural needs are at least part sun and regular moisture.\u00a0 Mulch is a help.\u00a0 Traditionally clematis are said to like \u201cheads in the sun and feet in the shade.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Jackman nursery went on to introduce other winning, large-flowered clematis, like \u2018Belle of Woking\u2019, with double blooms of pale lavender; \u2018Mrs. George Jackman\u2019, a semi-double white variety; and pink-flowered \u2018Duchess of Albany\u2019, with petals accented with darker pink stripes.\u00a0 Local nurseries and garden centers usually carry at least one or two large-flowered clematis at this time of year, but they are likely to be modern varieties.\u00a0 For a great selection of old and new clematis, including \u2018Duchess of Edinburgh\u2019 go to the specialists at Brushwood Nursery, www.brushwoodnursery.com<\/a>.\u00a0 Inventory is sold out right now, but signing up for their online newsletter will alert you to stock availability for fall planting.\"duchess<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I frequently tell people that my garden speaks and sometimes even sings to me.\u00a0 What I don\u2019t say is that the voices are in many different languages.\u00a0 Any given plant might have ancestry going back to one or more species native to Asia, Africa or one of the world\u2019s many other cradles of botanical diversity.\u00a0 … 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],"tags":[1639,2318,2317,2319,186,2316,2315,117,905],"class_list":["post-3095","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fall","category-general-interest","category-spring","category-summer","tag-clematis","tag-clematis-duchess-of-edinburgh","tag-clematis-jackmanii","tag-combing-plants","tag-heirloom-plants","tag-jackman-nursery","tag-large-flowered-clematis","tag-vines","tag-white-flowers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3095","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=3095"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3095\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3099,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3095\/revisions\/3099"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3095"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3095"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3095"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}