Pelargonium fulgidum hybrid - Scarlet Unique Geranium
Scientific Name: Pelargonium fulgidum hybrid (P. x ignescens)
Common Name: Scarlet Unique Geranium
Description: Tender perennial, grown as houseplant; brilliant vermilion-red flowers with a black center; soft green, aromatic foliage
Size: Grows upright into a 2 to 3 foot open and spreading plant
Cultural Information: Prefers full sun and rich, somewhat heavy, well-drained soil; easily propagated from cuttings in late winter or early spring of plants carried over indoors
USDA Zones: 10 and above
Historical Notes: This species was imported from southern and western Africa into Britain by 1723. Philadelphia nurseryman Bernard McMahon included the species, as "Celandine-leaved Geranium," in the list of greenhouse plants in his 1806 The American Gardener's Calendar.[1] The variety — Scarlet Unique or Old Scarlet Unique — is a hybrid of garden origin documented in cultivation by 1812.
- Peggy Cornett, n.d.
Further Sources
- Stuart, David and James Sutherland. Plants from the Past: Old Flowers for New Gardens. London: Penguin Books, 1989.
- Thomas Jefferson Center for Historic Plants.
References
- ^ Bernard McMahon, The American Gardener's Calendar, 1806 (Charlottesville: Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation, 1997), 618. See also pp. 83, 160, 355, 419, and 444.