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Penny Carnathan
Penny’s a Nurture And Hold (NAH): Nah, I won’t pull that out yet, it’s still got a green shoot. She likes dragonflies, lady bugs and new stuff only after weeding, pruning and fertilizing.
Kim Franke-Folstad
Kim’s a Want It Now (WIN): Everything pretty, everything now. She will resort to full-spectrum insecticides in desperate situations, and believes it’s her duty and right to buy new plants every weekend.
Both advocate Plant Choice (SOMEthing besides crotons. Please!), lots of color and low maintenance. We don’t agree on everything, but we’re smart enough to learn from each other - and from you.
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Stalking the elusive night-blooming desert cereus
Posted Jul 18, 2010 by Loren Omoto
Updated Jul 22, 2010 at 08:37 PM
Ever since I heard about night-blooming cereus a few years ago, I’ve been dying to see it—and film it—blooming.
Still pictures just aren’t enough. Part of the beauty of this flower is how quickly it opens—sometime after sundown, usually just once a year. I’ve heard stories abouut trees wrapped in vining cereus suddenly bursting into bloom. Everyone ooohs and aaahs at the spectacle. By morning, the blooms are gone and the plant is back to being a homely, non-descript cactus.
A few weeks ago, a Tribune Dirt reader, Laverne, left a voicemail for me on my office phone. “I have a huge night-blooming cereus!” she said. “It’s going to bloom tonight! Come see it!”
She left the message on a Saturday. I got it the following Monday. Too late. DARN DARN DARN.
But Laverne and I kept in touch and she called again a week ago.
“I have another night-blooming cereus. It’s a lot smaller, and it’s a different type, but it’s getting ready to bloom,” she said.
We were on the phone every night for a week as she monitored the blossoms for bloom-readiness. I got to know Laverne pretty well. She’s 88 and a diehard gardener. She’s a Marine Corps vet, 1943-45, and raised two daughters as a single parent. She’s sick and tired of lubbers, but not afraid to snip them in half, and she does her weeding at night—late, late at night—to escape the heat.
She’s one tough lady with a killer sense of humor. While I was walking around in the rain with her daughter, Diane, swatting mosquitoes and watching the big white cereus buds for signs of opening—camera at the ready—she called from the shelter of her porch,
“Don’t shoot till you see the whites of their eyes!”
Laughing, Laverne!!
Diane, by the way, is a chip off the adventurous block. She’s not into gardening, but was visiting her mom and was just as excited as me to watch a cereus bloom. I was glad to have a buddy to prowl around the plants with, since Laverne was not budging from her porch.
Here’s Diane. She did all the lighting for our video with a flashlight. A tough job—she just might have a fututre.
I got to Laverne’s about 8:15 p.m. The buds started opening about 9:15 p.m. The mosquitoes started hauling us away about 10. We hung in there another 45 minutes.
And here’s the movie—a plant safari, risking West Nile virus to bring you the rare night-blooming cereus.
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Reader Comments
Posted by (Iluvpumpkins) on July 19, 2010
Penny, This is a very sweet story, and I’m glad Laverne called you back. This is a I can’t sleep night, so I wish I blooms on my cereus, but the cold got it. They are very hard to catch to bloom, I always remember the next morning and they close up at daylight. How is your plant doing? Pumpkin
Posted by (Chip) on July 19, 2010
Wow cool video’s. out in the middle of the night in the rain and I bet you both were being eaten up alive from mosquitoes. Thanks, the videos were worth it! BTY Avon’s skin so soft bath oil works as a skeeter and no-see-emm repellent and is a lot easier on the skin and nose. ...“Chip”
Posted by (kgardens) on July 19, 2010
Enjoyed the video Penny. Boy, the things we do to see a flower! Or rather, the things YOU do. I’ve heard these flowers are also fragrant. Did you notice a fragrance? Laverne and Diane were very nice to allow you to video this flower opening. Thanks!
Posted by (RickBrown) on July 20, 2010
Great post, Penny. I have them in my trees and I have never seen them open…until now.
Posted by (Susan Gillespie) on July 21, 2010
What troopers you are, Penny, Laverne and Diane. Sitting through rain, mosquitoes and the dark to get this great video of the night blooming cereus. When a few of my family members lived in Key West they had a night blooming cereus cactus plant in the back yard. It smelled divine when it bloomed and was about 4 foot tall. Then I was in someone’s yard who had a night blooming cereus viney looking plant going up her tree.There must be a few forms of this plant. They really are worth the wait. Thanks for being so patient and sharing this with us.
Glad your cereus likes the company or the dragon wing, Penny.
Posted by (Janna) on July 21, 2010
What a cool video! Not only have I never seen a night blooming cereus, I’ve never even heard of one. It was beautiful! Thanks Laverne, Diane and Penny. The beauty of nature never ceases to amaze me…
Posted by (Chip) on July 22, 2010
I just love large flowering plants! I have lost count of how many times I have watched the video’s I wonder what kind of insect does the flower attract? bee’s and butterfly’s don’t come out at night. Diane and I ate dinner at our Daughter’s house [that kid can cook!] after I took a walk there was a heavy perfume smell in the air so I followed it thinking I would get a look at a cereus but it was a jasmine. I went back the next day to work on a project, and got a closer look this jasmine totally covered a very mature oak tree. The lady who owns the house was there and she told me she didn’t plant it there birds must have done it. and it has been there for 20 years! WOW made my day. ..“Chip”
Posted by (Janna) on July 22, 2010
Penny, thanks for the photo of the cereus vine climbing the tree in Forest Hills. I would love to get one for the oak in my back yard.
Susan, my angel wing cutting I got from you is doing really well, too. It loves its place in a pot on my patio…
Btw, that’s a great picture of Laverne on this post. She looks beautiful and happy. Dontcha’ just love gardeners? They all seem to be so nice.
Posted by (Susan Gillespie) on July 22, 2010
Oh Janna, I am so happy the angel wing babies have settled in so well. And I agree with you about how nice gardeners are. Maybe being that close to Nature lifts your spirit enough to let out the nice genes. Either that or the Ekert is really loose. (for Non-Sequitur fans)
Where IS Forest Hills anyway?
Chip and Diana are just the nicest people, speaking of nice gardeners. Chip always makes you want to run over there and taste everything they have put together.
Posted by (Chip) on July 22, 2010
Didn’t mean to make any one hungry! and it is a night blooming Confederate jasmine. And it has taken over the oak tree. The tree is old, the base is 8 foot around. and at lest 80 foot [ I am guessing] if you look at it from a distance you can see the jasmine go’s all the way to the top and on every branch I could see. Like I said the lady who owns it says she didn’t put it there but it must be in it’s “happy spot”...“Chip”
Posted by (Iluvpumpkins) on July 22, 2010
I have a night blooming Jasmine and until this year something has eaten all the blooms, but this year you walk outside in the evening and its like wow! What is that smell. So I guess they loved the very never ending cold winter we had, and the lubbers are full on all the other plants. I would like another one for my backyard, if anyone see them for sale let me know? Pumpkin
Posted by (Susan Gillespie) on July 23, 2010
I have a night blooming jasmine as well. It gets to be a huge bush and I planted it a little too close to the house, but the smell is divine. Something always eats all the flowers off every year too, Pumpkin, and since it blooms at night I am never out there to see what it is. Plus it’s right by the front of the garage so It’s definitely in a spot where I don’t completely benefit from it’s fragrance. I wonder if we can propagate it from branches. Let me try.