Monday, September 04, 2006

Night Blooming Cereus


It's been a HOT summer. Worried that one of my precious plant might burn from the sun, I moved it to a shady spot. It's not close to a water faucet, so I have to water the plant from afar - with a hose. One day, I decided to put some plant food in a watering can and carried it over to water the plant. Lo and behold - it had 2 dead blooms on it! I was so sad - I missed the blooms.
My family loves plants. We have all kind of strange plants. Most of them are too exotic for the climate that I live in. I usually put these tropical plants in containers and move them into my sunroom in the winter time. About 3 years ago, I was over at my cousin, she had some kind of cuttings in water. I asked her what it was, she didn't know but said she got it from her mom. Asked me if I wanted it. Of course, it's a plant, I want it. Took it home, plant it. Didn't know what it was (name or anything) or how to care for it. A year later, a friend of mine, a master gardener, was over for lunch - I asked her about the plant. She told me it was called a 'Passalong' plant, because so many people take cuttings from it. She gave me the technical name for it too. I looked it up on the Internet and was so excited to read about the flower. Cool! Flowers the size of a dinner plate.
Three years later, it bloomed and I missed it.
Well, the gods were kind to me. 3 weeks ago, I went outside to visit my Night Blooming Cereus and saw buds! This week, it awarded me with 4 flowers. The fragrance was unbelievable.

I stayed up late to watch it bloomed. My mother told me that my great grandmother use to have a big ol' tree at her house in Hanoi. They would have about 80 blooms on it. It's a rare occasions for farmers to stay up late, but they did for these 80 blooms.
I think the Vietnamese name for this flower is Hoa Thanh Long. There are certain species with fruits - Dragonfruit. I don't think the one I have will fruit. My cactus leaves are flat.
Stay tune... next month... Plumeria blooms!

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5 Comments:

At 6:27 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I think it's called Hoa Quynh or Quynh Huong in Vietnamese.

 
At 4:24 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Oh, "hoa quynh". "hoa thanh long" is similar too but on those pictures is "hoa quynh". we had "hoa quynh" at our house too. it smells so good. My grandmom said it's good for health. She embalmed her tea with "hoa quynh" and drank that tea everyday.

 
At 12:49 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I have these plants too!

I once foolishly cut the bloom and placed it in a bowl of water on my dinner table when friends came round for dinner. instead of the heavenly fragrant huge white bloom, my dinner guests found a shrivelled sad white mess of petals. The fragrance did linger. I have since been trying to photograph the flower whenever it blooms but have failed :-( Lesson? don't preserve the bloom. Let it stay on the plant!

We call them 'Moon Flower' here (Australia). Initially, my partner and I called them 'alien plants' because they were so odd looking. And then we found out, from a gardening aficionado much like yourself by the sounds of it, its true common name.

 
At 11:41 PM, Blogger Thuy said...

my husband said they look like the 'people eating flower' in the movie 'Little Shop of Horror'! :)

 
At 12:26 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hi, thanks for sharing the pictures. I recently heard that Hoa Quynh is the nature cure for Asthma "hen suyen", is this true? And where can I get it?

 

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