Really A Fragrant Bouquet

I love fragrant flowers and try my best to collect them in our garden.  Many of them have to stay in pots as they are tropical plants.  As we are running out of space in the basement, I try not to get a new tropical plant.  I also try not to propagate plants I have.  It’s hard to do since I regularly prune them in spring when I take them out in the garden.  I don’t want to throw healthy branches away so I stick them in a new pot and they take root.  Some plants have been with us for many years and have grown much bigger so space is getting tight down there.

I couldn’t pass up the Cashmere Bouquet (Clerodendrum philippinum) when I saw one in a nursery offering a couple of years ago.  Even though I know how fast it can grow and its need for space, but one is enough.

It a big leaf plant with white, sometimes pale pink clustered flowers.  It’s fragrance is lightly sweet and musky and cannot be replicated.  It reminded me of home, of childhood.  I think it’s the same reason why I grow jasmine and have been collecting varieties of them.

I mentioned that one plant is enough, but they are two now.  The old habit is hard to get rid of.  I repotted it in spring to give it some legroom but I also split it at the same time.  I wish I could grow it in the garden so I could have a whole patch.  It can be grown out side in warmer USDA Zone 7 and up.  But be warned, they can produce suckers and develop a colony very fast.

If you wish to grow it in a pot, it may not bloom as it likes direct sunlight.  But if you have a window with plenty of light, it’s doable.  One year I had a plant light right on it, to my surprise it bloomed in winter.  Keep the soil on the dry side otherwise it will rot.