Merry Christmas! Okay, perhaps not. This posted at midnight, precisely as Christmas Day ended. These are not exactly Christmas flowers anyway. They are not even Christmas colors. The pictures are actually from the previous week. I knew then that I would not likely want to go out to get pictures last week. Until now, Christmas was the priority. There was no work to go to.

My six are very limited this week. There are only two genera and three species. There could be more if the Osteospermum have species designations. I know them only as ‘hybrids’. If there are any cultivar names, I do not know what any of them are.

1. Lantana montevidensis – grows as a ground cover. The color range of the bloom is limited. This color is common, but I thought that individual flowers more commonly have white centers.

2. Lantana camara – is the ‘other’ lantana. It is shrubbier and better foliated. Floral color is more variable and generally more brightly colored. Bloom is not as extensive, but is more prolific.

3. Lantana camara – likes this particular landscape where I got these pictures. Another solitary specimen down the road and at a lower elevation already looks shabby from cooling weather.

4. Osteospermum – within this landscape are all modern hybrids. If anyone knows who their parents are, they do not share such information anymore. I think this color might be ‘lavender’.

5. Osteospermum – looks more purplish than the previous picture. I am no good with colors. Despite the attributes of modern hybrids, I still prefer old fashioned Osteospermum fruticosum.

6. Osteospermum – colors are not easy to describe. Is this one light burgundy red or ruddy pink? There might be six or so cultivars here. This unidentifiable color happens to be my favorite.

This is the link for Six on Saturday, for anyone else who would like to participate:

https://thepropagatorblog.wordpress.com/2017/09/18/six-on-saturday-a-participant-guide/

20 thoughts on “Six on Saturday: Flowery Bits III”

    1. Lantana a nice from a distance, but I find their aroma rather objectionable. They are nice at work because no one else gets close enough to notice the aroma. (They probably would not mind anyway.) Osteospermum are sort of cliche. For my own garden, I would like to get some of the old fashioned sort that we knew as ‘freeway daisy’. They are not as pretty, but they are familiar.

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  2. I enjoy Lantana, both our native and cultivated species. My favorite thing about them is their square-ish buds that look like little packages, and you’ve captured those perfectly. As for Christmas, those Twelve Days began yesterday and run until Epiphany on January 6. You’re right on time!

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    1. Native?! I gave no thought to where they are from. I know they naturalize in some regions, but that does not count.
      Whether or not Christmas continues, most here think it is done. Sad Christmas trees will soon appear at the curbs for recycle. Many will mysteriously arrive here in our big greenwaste pile. I wish I had a home for all the tired poinsettias that will be out there next. I dislike poinsettias as potted plants, but they can be nice in the right spot in the garden. There are too many different cultivars to get a good uniform hedge of them.

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      2. I was aware of another native species of poinsettia, but not this one. I just learned about the native poinsettia of Florida recently, and now I like it, just because it is from Florida. The common potted poinsettia does reasonably well in sheltered spots here, but really dislikes cool weather.

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    1. One of ours does that. It is a single specimen located down the road from the landscape where the rest of the lantana lives. The foliage succumbs to frost because it is in a cool spot. I cut it to the ground. It comes right back and gets about six feet tall. I think the others would look better if they got cut back like that, and regenerated.

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  5. I enjoyed your six. It gets slightly colder here in Oregon than when I lived in CA, so I can’t grow your picks, other than as annuals, and I don’t bother. I love lantana. And African daisies? Don’t get me started! There’s a garden blogger (Late to the Garden Party) who always makes me drool over her Arctotis ‘Pink Sugar’ and others.

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    1. I think that if African daisies were to be grown as annuals, I would not mind them so much. As perennials, I expect to engage them like the older species. They are quite distinct. They are quite pretty though.

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    1. Osteospermum are African daisy. I knew the old fashioned sorts as freeway daisies, since they were somewhat common in old freeway landscapes.
      Is Lantana involucrata available in nurseries? I have seen white ground cover lantana, but just considered it to be white Lantana montevidensis.

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