Back in stock, but only just...

You probably can’t imagine how pleased we are to see this flower in our polytunnel.

We know it as Osteospermum ‘Deep Pink Form’, though it’s not at all clear that that’s its correct name – there are several remarkably similar looking cultivars listed in RHS Plant Finder, so a bit of botanical detective work might be useful to see which is which, or even if the different named plants are actually different.

But anyway – we’ve grown this plant for a long time, probably selling thousands over the years, and they’ve all been propagated from a single plant which was originally a gift from Nick’s mum, maybe 25 years ago, so it has a certain sentimental as well as financial value.

The usual routine on the nursery with vegetatively propagated plants is that the parent plants are renewed each year, by discarding or selling the older ones, and keeping back half a dozen of the most recently prop’d specimens to provide next years cuttings.   Simple enough you’d think, and of course it is, as long as you keep parents and progeny apart, and only sell the ones that you’re supposed to sell.    This year somehow we managed to break this golden rule, and the cry of consternation that went up when we realised we’d sold ALL our stock was audible for miles around.

No stock, at all, of one of the first plants that Barlow Nurseries ever propagated or sold.   Arghghgh!

But there is, of course, a happy ending.   One of the pleasures of running a small nursery is that we know a huge proportion of our customers personally, and thanks to Louise’s elephantine memory, we knew at least one garden where some of the last batch of these plants had gone.   And we knew they’d been acquired to enliven a garden that was opening for charity in a few weeks time, so a deal was struck – we supplied some plants for their plant stall, and in return, were allowed to take a few cuttings of the Osteospermum.

So all’s well that ends well – well, we hoped so, but weren’t very confident.   It was mid-summer, hadn’t rained for a couple of weeks, the plants had been planted at the foot of some very hungry and thirsty conifers, and we were there at midday.   If you had to describe a scenario from which cuttings were least likely to succeed, this would have to be a strong contender.   But we were desperate, pressed on regardless, and as sometimes happens, the plants confounded us.

We managed to find 18 shoots which looked as if they just might make viable cuttings, carried them back to the nursery as if they were gold dust, and got them onto the propagating bench in double quick time.   And remarkably from 18 cuttings, we’ve now got 18 plants, the first of which to flower is shown in the picture.

So Osteospermum ‘Deep Pink Form’ lives on at Barlow Nurseries, and stocks WILL be available in spring 2010!

Plant finder lists them as H3-4, although we find them reliably hardy, they form an attractive mat of narrow mid-green foliage, and flower their socks off from june until the frosts tell them to take a break.   Cut back hard in the following spring, they’ll do it all again, and again, and again.  Easy, reliable, very floriferous, an absolute front-of-border beauty.  We haven’t grown it for 25 years for nothing!

This entry was posted on Friday, September 25th, 2009 at 22:09 and is filed under Plants. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.