Take your pick
Medinilla was the belle of the ball. Elegant in pink, attracting everyone's attention. Who was this exotic beauty? Making a splashy debut at Canada Blooms 2012, the Philippine plant was everywhere, and still visitors couldn't get enough of the new plant.
"We started growing them a year and a half ago," said Ted Oorsprong of Northend Gardens in Jordan Station.
Oorsprong, who is also chair of Pick Ontario, said the plant prefers similar growing conditions to an orchid. It also blooms like an orchid, flowering for three to five months.
"The blooms can last two months. If you can get an orchid to rebloom, you can get the Medinilla to rebloom," he said. "It likes light, but indirect sun. It likes the high heat outside in the summer."
Though Medinilla was the "it" plant, there were plenty of other new plants at the 16th annual horticultural show last month in Toronto. New and improved cultivars are developed each year at the University of Guelph, Landscape Ontario, Vineland Research and Innovation Centre and the Royal Botanical Gardens. They're bred specifically for southern Ontario and assessed for how successfully they adapt to our climate.
