Saturday, June 26, 2010

Michelia Champaca

    The Joy Perfume Tree.....and yes, the scent of the flowers  makes one feel good indeed . Just one flower, and the scent is so amazingly strong and intoxicating. I love to pick the flowers and bring them into the house. Place it anywhere in the house and that place really smells good.  I left a couple of the flowers in the bathroom and it was good  for two days. After that the flowers turned brown and unsightly. Pour away the water in the container, but the container still bears the perfume from the flowers. Interesting.


The Michelia Champaca is easy to care for. I first bought it almost a year ago. It was just one stalk then with some leaves. After planting it, I notice it grew very fast. We were thinking of buying a tree that would provide shade for the kitchen.  We could have planted a fruit tree or something. My husband wanted the Red Tip plant, but I thought a tree with scented flowers will be better.  Now that the plant has grown so much within the year and blooming now, I really love it.  The tree is still too small  to provide adequate shade, but  given more time, when the branches spread more,  it will be really  nice. Even parts of the plant smells nice. As new leaves spring out, it leaves behind a thin layer of some sort brown bark. Crush it and the scent is nice as well. 



A house down from my block has a white champaca.  I  was tempted to buy a white champaca as well, but then the flowers of my jasmines and gardenia are white.  The nursery told me the white champaca  can be potted and still blooms but the yellow champaca needs will grow too big for the pot.

 

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