Zaluzianskya capensis is a South African perennial with flowers that open late in the day and into the evening and are have a very potent fragrance. I’ve seen it described as smelling of freshly baked cake or burnt candy and that may be the case if you live somewhere warm where the fragrance can waft into the night air. But since I live where it is too cold for that I have to lay down on the ground and stick my nose right into the flowers. It isn’t a bad smell but it is pretty potent. Imagine being locked in a small room with dozens of bouquets of lilacs and peonies. Now imagine someone covered the lilacs and peonies in sugar and lit them on fire. If you can imagine what that would smell like you have a pretty good idea of what Zaluzianskya smells like.
Super easy from seed though. Worth giving them a try if you like smelly things! The flowers are cute too.
Berlandiera lyrata (the yellow daisy flowers above with purple thyme flowers) on the other hand has a delightful cocoa smell. It is a perennial from Texas and the southwest and is a much hardier option than Cosmos sanguineus with a similar chocolate smell. It is also one of the success stories of my path garden which I promise I will blog about really soon(ish).
These things are so weird! Very cool.
I will peaceably await the path garden update because I know you’ll have lots of great photos to share when you get to it.
Hahaha…your description of the smell made me LOL!
I remember the chocolate cosmos was used in Ralph Lauren’s perfume, Notorious, to beautiful effect. But it can be so hard to grow. Glad to hear about an alternative!
Your description of your smelly Zaluzianskya capensis made me laugh! I’ve grown it before but because we also have cool nights, I never noticed much of a wafting fragrance either. After hearing your description, I want to try it again to see if I can detect the sugared compost heap on fire aroma.
I am going to make ait a mission to get one!!! thank you
felicitaciones tienes un jardin maravilloso… tome algunas fotos para tomar de inspiracion… saludos
Hello Plantpropaganda,
I have seen great Oophytum oviforme photo on your Flickr site. How fast does Oophytum grow in Cali? Mine are over 1 year old, and still only measure 1mm in diameter.
They are I think almost a year old and are still so tiny. Slowest growing mesembs I have tried so far. But they have just started putting up some new growth. I am afraid to pot them up.
My Oophytum went dormant over the summer even though they were just 1mm. I thought they would never wake up. Now they are up, but growing very slowly. I agree, the slowest growing mesembs I have tried (and I tried over a hundred).
Yeah I have Mitrophyllum grande and Monilaria pisiformis that were all 1/4 of an inch to 1/2 an inch tall at most that went dormant. I just gave them water and am happy to see that despite being so tiny some of them are showing signs of life. Mesembs are pretty remarkable.
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