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Pictured
is Alma Bodiford with a poster of her "Alma’s Star" hibiscus
at the 2nd annual Southern Favorites Home and Garden Show in Montgomery.
Alma’s
love of gardening and especially her fondness for unusual plants have
been featured in the Cooperative Farming News before. Now this
Luverne gardener has made horticultural history.
In
the spring of 1997, Alma was feeling a bit under the weather and wasn’t
up to planting a fist full of Confederate Rose hibiscus cuttings
individually, so she put them together in one large hole in the red clay
of her garden. She has so many ornamental plants in her lawn that if the
cuttings didn’t survive, she had others to fall back on.
Most
of the cuttings did survive and when they bloomed in the fall she
noticed one of the plants had thrown a sport (mutation). The huge pink
blossom it produced looked to be five flowers in one sprouting from a
single stem!
"It’s
virtually unheard of," said Bill Cook, vice president of the
Southern Home and Garden Nursery and Greenhouses in Montgomery. He said
the plant, named "Alma’s Star" will be available exclusively
at their nursery in May. "It’s very unusual, and we think it will
be very popular."
"Alma’s
Star" should be a hardy variety growing to over 10 feet and
well-suited to all the regions of Alabama and United States Department
of Agriculture Zones 7-9.
For
more information call Southern Homes and Gardens at 334-387-0440 or
visit them in Montgomery at 8820 Vaughn Road. |
