Featured Plant of the Week (Blushing Bride)
Blushing Bride
The delicately beautiful Blushing Bride is definitely among the more striking examples of protea. Native only to the mountain sides of the Hottentots Holland Nature Reserve in South Africa, this plant is so scarce in nature that it has twice been considered extinct. Widespread cultivation has saved Blushing Bride from disappearing forever, but conservationists still struggle to keep its tenuous presence in nature from disappearing forever. Popular as a decorative house plant and in the cut flower trade, Blushing Bride makes an excellent choice when you need a flowering plant that truly stands out.
Blushing Bride is an erect evergreen shrub and often produces six or more flowering stems covered with thin needle-like leaves. Each flowering stem ends with anything from one to about a dozen buds, depending on the variety, that naturally bloom from December to March. Producing white papery bracts in a star burst, the actual flowers take the form of pink downy tufts, which is what gives the plant its signature blush of color.
There appears to be little agreement about the history of Blushing Bride, but it was first officially discovered by Carl Thunberg in 1773 on the Franschhoek Mountains of South Africa. He named it Serruria florida; Serruria refers to the botanist J. Surrurier, and florida is Latin for something like 'free flowering.' Outside of that, things start to get pretty unclear. The reason why is that although it had been collected and described by Thunberg, it was not seen again for over 100 years. Botanists had to assume that it was extinct when it could not be found again.
Then at about the turn of the 20th Century accounts of its rediscovery start to crop up. One describes a Professor Harold Pearson finding Serruria florida at a Franschhoek flower show in 1914, and then allegedly collecting the seeds that all commercial cultivars come from. However, an earlier account from 1900 claims that the plant was found in a remote location in the Franschhoek Valley. An even earlier claim states that a Professor Peter MacOwan rediscovered Serruria florida, and it was he that collected the seeds that would be used to cultivate the world's modern crops. Regardless of when or who actually rediscovered Blushing Bride, it has since become a widespread and popular commercial crop.
The question of Serruria florida's common name is also a source of some confusion. It may simply be that it was a popular choice for bridal bouquets at French Huguenot weddings. However popular legend goes that French Huguenot farmers would propose to their brides-to-be with it worn on their lapels, and that's why people were inspired to draw a comparison with the flower's color. Other versions say that a young man would give the flower to a woman he was courting. The deeper the pink was on the flower, the more apparent the suitor's intentions, to the embarrassment of the maiden of course. It's also possible these stories are baseless folklore, since apparently there's little evidence to support that the flower had a common name at all before its commercial cultivation.
Sorting out the past of Blushing Bride might be difficult, but caring for it certainly isn't. It will take direct sun and indeed prefers it, and it copes with dryness well. The only two points to be careful about is that when repotting use a well draining soil, and to avoid over fertilizing since most Protea are usually at home in poor soil conditions. Otherwise just keep the soil moist and your Blushing Bride will produce beautiful and long lasting blooms.
Serruria florida is available now at BloomRite® Gardens in 6" grower's pots for $9.95 per plant.
