Tale of an Abutilon

It took awhile to get this post on, as Mom had to show me how to get the pictures off of the digital camera. It seems like a suspiciously simple process but will no doubt confuse me when I go to do it myself. But the whole point is that I wanted to introduce this Abutilon to my faithful readers. These plants are commonly known as flowering maples and are in the Mallow family (Malvaceae). As those of you closest to me will know I have been having a lot of Mallow related botanical experiences in the past year or so and this is one of them. This plant, Abutilon striatum, had been on my wish list at Annie's for some time. Therefore one can imagine my excitement when I found a flat of these little plants there before they had even been listed as available on-line! So I picked out a little 4 inch pot containing a plant that was about 7 inches tall and planted it in a large pot. This was in mid-July and the plant has grown about one foot per month since then. Huge, brilliantly green palmate leaves began to unfold one after the other - smooth and delightful leaves! And about three weeks ago it began to bloom - spectacular, as you can see! Of course the whole time it was growing I worried - the Summer sun would hit the plant in the morning and it would wilt (I started shading it with the shed door), I was afraid it wouldn't bloom in the pot, and worried I wouldn't like the flowers. But my fears were unfounded and once it roots settled in it stopped wilting. It now gets only about an hour or two of sun per day on the uppermost portion of the plant, the rest is entirely in the shade and it seems happy. So there it is - an exciting tale of a very satisfactory plant adventure!