Nemesia

Plant Characteristics

Cultivation

Scientific Names

Nemesia >

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Read about Nemesia in the Standard Cyclopedia of Horticulture

Nemesia (old name used by Dioscorides for some sort of snapdragon). Scrophulariaceae, The genus includes attractive flower-garden half-hardy annuals. Herbs annual or perennial, sometimes undershrubs, the annual kinds having come into cult: lvs. opposite: fls. very variable in color, from yellow to white and purple, in terminal racemes or axillary (racemose in the garden kinds), the pedicels bractless; calyx 5-parted; corolla with short tube which in front bears a spur or pouch; corolla-limb 2-lipped, the upper or posterior lip 4-notched or -cleft and the lower or anterior of one shallow-notched or entire lobe with palate at base; stamens 4, didynamous, the anthers 1-celled and usually cohering about the stigma; ovary 2-celled: caps, with boat-shaped valves.—Species about 50, of which a very few are Trop. African and the remainder S. African. Cf. Hiern, Flora Capensis, IV: II (1904). N. strumosa was one of the horticultural novelties in the last part of the 19th century. The fls. are very distinct in shape and have a wide range of color. They are about an inch across and borne in great profusion. If started indoors in March and transferred to the open in May the plants will furnish continuous bloom from June to Sept. The colors range from white, through pale yellow and rose, to orange and crimson, with numerous intermediate shades and a great variety of throat markings. This species has been known to botanists nearly a whole century; it grows only 50 miles from Cape Town, and it exhibits all these colors in the wild, yet it was never exploited until 1893, the first live plants seen in Eu. being shown in 1892. Sixteen distinct color varieties were recognized in the first batch of cult. plants, and the process of selecting strains has probably only begun. The nemesias are of easy cult. They may stand about 6 in. apart in the garden beds. The above text is from the Standard Cyclopedia of Horticulture. It may be out of date, but still contains valuable and interesting information which can be incorporated into the remainder of the article. Click on "Collapse" in the header to hide this text.

Cultivation

Gallery

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References

• Standard Cyclopedia of Horticulture, by L. H. Bailey, MacMillan Co., 1963

External links

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