A fragrant plant like no other: The Lady of the Night, a Plant with Attitude

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If you want to add a fragrant plant to you collection, the Brunfelsia Americana or the Lady of the Night is one of the most fragrant plants that you will find. It is very hard to find for sale, but there are some nursery and plant websites that have the seeds or young plants for sale.

What makes this plant so amazing? The plant lets out a powerful aroma just a few seconds after sundown and then will close up and not have any smell during the day. The aroma lasts all evening and gives the night a pleasant sweet smell that one could hardly forget.

The smell of the Brunfelsia Americana is a fragrance that is complex and satisfying. Once you get a smell you will be coming back again and again. It smells somewhat like Jasmine but has a lasting smell of cloves and cinnamon.

If you smell it for the first time with other people, you can be sure the conversation will turn back to the aroma over and over. This flower is normally native to the West Indies, but it is gaining popularity in the United States year by year. It is an upright fragrant plant with a leathery, dark green, leaf. The great thing about this plant is that pests rarely bother it.

Some people consider the Brunfelsia Americana a shrub, but with its thin, delicate appearance it is hard to imagine a shrub at all. The thin plant grows straight up with only intermediate branching. With so little limbs and appendages there is very little pruning needed at all. It is pretty tough because it needs very little water and even less food. If you get one of these fragrant plants in your house or in your yard, you can expect a long life if you take care of them. Some plants have shown good health even after twenty years.

The flowering cycle in a tropical climate like Southern Florida can be as little as a small cluster or can expand up to five feet. The flowers, about five inches, are white and will fade to a pale yellow as it ages. When the cycle is right, the Brunfelsia Americana can fill the night with its beautiful smells as some plants exhibit 100s of flowers on one evening alone.

You will especially see this extravaganza during the humid part of the summer, because the humidity helps the plant bloom and holds its fragrance.

If you want to take that beautiful aroma of the Lady of the Night, the Brunfelsia Americana, inside, cut the flowers at night. This will allow you to have the best of the aroma to saturate your house with this lovely smell. Just cut the stem and place it in a vase of water and neighbors and visitors will be sure to make comments on the beautiful fragrance that the flower gives off.

One fragrant plant flower cut and brought inside can keep your family and home smelling sweet with the smell of flowers without the chemicals and the use of an aerosol.

Japanese Honeysuckle: Invasive Weed or Beautiful Ground Cover

Here is a pleasant, fragrant plant If you ever have walked down a country road in the south you may have stopped to smell and admire the Japanese Honeysuckle. You may also remember, as a child, stripping a flower down so you could suck the sweet nectar.

Well, pretty as it is, some people feel that the honeysuckle is an aggressive fragrant plant that chokes out others and stakes a piece of land out for itself. In the shade of forest edges and in stream corridors, this fragrant plant takes over by shading the area and killing off the other plants that need the sun.

Native shrubs and even small trees can be caught in the deadly shadow of the Japanese Honeysuckle. If not killed, the shade could stump the growth of the sun dependent plant and render unable to reproduce.

The honeysuckle even has a death grip the will wrap around the stem of other plants and grasp them and keep water from transporting up and down the stem. Other plants are safe as long as they keep away from the shaded areas that the honeysuckle so wants to live in. They can survive longer if they stay away from dense growth away from other plants.

The Japanese honeysuckle can grow up to thirty feet or more. It is a woody vine that is covered with fine hairs and as they grow older they become hollow and the bark will peel and shred. The leaves are about two inches long and are lobed.

Each leaf is green or evergreen and the darkness of that green will be determined by the harshness of the winter. The flowers can’t be missed. They are trumpet shaped and are colored creamy white unless aged, and then they turn a pale yellow. These flowers are fragrant and occur in pairs up and down the vine.

One would not think so, but he Japanese Honeysuckle produces berries. These berries have few seeds and they mature every autumn. Even though there are few seeds produced, the plant will colonize almost any setting. Whether it is a roadside ditch or deep in the forest, the plant will find its niche and propagate.

The negative thing about the honeysuckle is that it will invade disturbed lands when nature or man knocks the balance of nature out of whack. If an insect infestation or man made disturbances occur, the plant will quickly become a nuisance killing off the native species and taking over.

The Japanese Honeysuckle is native to Eastern Asia and was brought over in the 1800s as a ground cover. Now it can be found in the central eastern and southern reaches of the United States. The only thing that has kept the plant from spreading all over the US in the sever winters.

This fragrant plant does not do well in the cold at all. Seen as a weed in some areas, people have tried to manage the weed by using chemicals and by putting in special laws that prohibit the plant to be transported over state lines. If you love the honeysuckle, the weed idea should be out the window because it is a beautiful fragrant plant that can decorate your garden or just cover a fence or deck.

_________________________________________________________________ Tropical Hydrangea: A fragrant plant of the African Continent

The Tropical Hydrangea is not a fragrant plant, its actually a fast growing, medium size tree that also can be grown as a shrub. The tree can grows as big as fifteen feet, but with proper trimming and pruning, it can easily be shaped as a shrub for smaller gardens.

If you choose to trim, do so after the flowers have dropped off for the year which will happen in the spring and in mid September. You will be amazed the flowers will remain on the plant for a long time after they have died. To keep your plant looking its best, you might want to take off the old or dead flowers even before they fall of on their own.

The size and width of the tree is as big or as small as you need it to be in accordance to your growing area and preference. You can trim the tree pretty far back and it will not have a deformed appearance or look stunted. If you live in a temperate climate, the Tropical Hydrangea does not loose it leaves unless the temperature falls below twenty degrees.

The fragrant plant loves plenty of sun and it is a heavy feeder. It needs plenty of water and fertilizer for the best growth. The plant will produce its flowers at the beginning of the year and most of the time they last for more than a month at a time.

The Tropical Hydrangea has pink flowers that are about an inch and a half across and can have bracts up to two and a half inches long. In the winter the plants cover the entire shrub and tree and can bring the winter doldrums back to life with the fragrant aroma and the pink contrast to the otherwise winter brown and gold.

The tree can also be contrasted with other tropical fragrant plant varieties and the flowers can be mixed with plants with white flowers to give a unique look to your plant ensembles. You might want to try to divide your Tropical Hydrangea because the plant develops multiple canes that have a better chance of success than those that grow out of a single trunk as with a tree.

When you do divide, think of dividing like you are transplanting a shrub from one place to the other. The only difference here is that you are transporting only one portion of the tree or shrub instead of the whole thing. This works no matter if you are replanting new hydrangeas or repotting old potted plants that you have had for years.

So next time that you go to your favorite green house or nursery, or even if you are shopping for a fragrant plant online, try a Tropical Hydrangea for your yard or patio. The pink flowers will give the yard a special look, even in winter, and the aroma will add a bit of motif to the other flowers and fragrant plants that you have in your yard. Make sure your climate supports it and make modifications if it does not.

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A wonderful fragrant plant (Tropical Lilac): Florida’s Treasure

The Tropical Lilac: These fragrant plants grow as tall as twenty feet and they are as wide as the crown that spreads above it. The plant is popular because it seems disease and pest free but this may diminish since there has been spotting of the Sri Lanka weevil which can damage its leaves. The damage is cosmetic and will not hurt your tree but will give your garden or backyard an unkempt look.If you decide to get fragrant plant, you may have to plant this Tropical Lilac is a sunny spot that receives plenty of water. You can even plant it in an area that has a little bit of shade and trim it back to be a small tree or bush. A spot by the deck or patio awning can provide a lot of shade and at the same time allow you to experience the tropical green leaves and fresh smell of the lilac blossom.

Don’t worry about aggression with this beautiful plant, it will fit right in with other species and not have a trouble coexisting.

The fragrant scent of the Tropical Lilac or Cornutia Grandifolia is unlike anything you have ever smelled before. It’s strong floral fragrance has graced the bodies of socialites for decades as its scent is used to produce some of the finest perfumes and toilet waters.

The scent also is used in candles, incense, aerosol air fresheners, and a plethora of other products. The question is why do you have to purchase these products to have the fresh smell of lilac in your yard? The plant itself is enough to provide an array of scents to keep the yard or your house smelling good all during the blooming season.

As your tree blossoms, you will notice dry seed pods. These pods can make your tree look shoddy. The pods can stay on your tree for several weeks if you do not remove them yourself. You might want to consider sharing the pods with friends and family because the seeds are fairly easy to grow and you can share the wealth with your peers.

Just make a wide hole deep enough for the roots to take hold and the sapling to break the soils surface. Water it well and make sure the dirt or soil is compacted within it. You only need to fertilize it lightly, but do so on an frequent basis.

So if you wish to have a good looking tree or fragrant plant in your yard with very little maintenance, you should really consider a Tropical Lilac. Not only does this fragrant plants aroma fill your yard with a smell that is sweet as honey, the foliage on the tree can give you plenty of coverage near your deck or patio.

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