Flower of the Day: Bougainvillea
As any of us Road Trips Gardeners know first hand, it’s really, really hard to convince a bougainvillea plant to blossom as a house plant.
In places such as Maui (where this photo was taken), bougainvillea grow in such profusion that their default hue (a shocking, shocking pink) colors garden walls and hillsides.
According to Wikipedia, bougainvillea is a genus of flowering plants native to South America from Brazil west to Peru and south to southern Argentina (Chubut Province). The plant was classified in Brazil in 1768 by Philibert Commerçon, a French botanist accompanying French Navy admiral and explorer Louis Antoine de Bougainville during his voyage of circumnavigation.
Bougainvillea are evergreen where rainfall occurs all year, or deciduous if there is a dry season. There are more than 300 varieties around the world.
(Photo © Susan McKee)