Sunday, May 01, 2005

Luminous

We have a plant in the garden which I bought a few years ago. I have long since forgotten what it's called. (Maybe a reader can enlighten me?) It has beautiful cascading white flowers at this time of year, and when I am out in the garden in the evening, when it is almost dark, it appears to glow luminously. The effect is stunning.

When I took this picture the flash didn't work for some reason, so it turned out unexpectedly well.

5 comments:

Badaunt said...

A Japanese friend told me the name in Japanese, and I looked it up:

http://tinyurl.com/8osnt (in Japanese, but with great pictures)

http://www.floridata.com/ref/s/spir_can.cfm
(In English where they note, embarrassingly, that it 'thrives on neglect', and also that they prefer sun. Ours is in the shade most of the time and is certainly neglected.)

It is Spiraea cantoniensis, with the common names of Reeves' spirea, double bridal wreath, and double Reeves.

There is also one with a larger flower, called Oodemari (http://tinyurl.com/8qmtr)

'Temari' actually refers to these hand-made balls: http://www.allesoverballen.com/engels/TEMARI.html

'Oo' means large, and 'ko' means small. But the latin names are different, which means (I suppose) that they're not actually the same sort of plant...?

Anonymous said...

They look beautiful! Are they fragrant, too?

http://pimme.blog-city.com

Badaunt said...

No scent (that I've noticed). It's probably just as well, though - I have roses and honeysuckle blooming very soon and overlapping, and it could get a bit overwhelming!

Steve said...

Funny... I can't see the sail boat...

Anonymous said...

I had to cringe when I saw your photo. Yep, I know those flowers all to well. I am so allergic to them that it's scary!