Summer Flowers – Hibiscus

The colorful flowers of the Hibiscus attracted me to this plant a number of years ago. Quite a number of them seem to have followed me home. Most are the exotic or fancy hybrid Hibiscus, but several are the larger cold hardy variety.

The Exotics

With hundreds of color combinations the exotic Hibiscus blooms are breathtaking. Sadly the flowers only last for a day. However, in the late spring and summer the buds are plentiful with new flowers every few days.

These Hibiscus thrive in our southern Louisiana hot and humid summers. They don’t tolerate cold weather so all of mine are potted. They go into the greenhouse in the winter where they continue to bloom. Below are just a few of the images I’ve taken so far this summer.

(Click on an image to enlarge)

The colors are so vivid. The flowers so graceful, even the imperfect ones are beautiful.

The orange, multi-colored flower is a new one for me this year. Somehow it got into my cart when I was picking up top soil.

The Cold Hardy

I only have three plants that stay outside year round. They have much larger flowers than the exotics. All of them are about 5-6 feet tall. They die completely back in the winter. It takes them awhile to grow back so they don’t start blooming until mid-summer.

This plant has lived in my pond for many years. We thought we’d lost it with the cold weather this spring, but it has come back even bigger and fuller than usual. The flowers are a good 10″ or more across and there are plenty of them.

Every morning the dogs and I go out to see what Mother Nature has gifted us with. It’s a great way to start the day. I hope you’ve enjoyed the images. Thank you for joining me!

I had hoped that my upgraded website would be up and running this week, but a technical glitch has forced me to wait another week. For those of you who subscribe to my posts, you will be getting an email asking you to re-subscribe. The website doesn’t allow me to carry over the subscriptions. I apologize in advance for the inconvenience.

Until the next post….Cheryl