Unpronounceable beauty

Living in Riverdale, we are spoiled by our proximity to the New York Botanical Garden. It has 240 lush acres filled with flowers, extraordinary tree collections, specialty gardens and regular exhibitions in the Conservatory. And for those of a more academic bent, it has one of the best botanical libraries. It is filled with journals devoted to multiple areas of botanical interest — paleobotany, desert plants, mosses and bonsai, to name just a few.

Since we travel to Israel frequently for family, we sometimes try to add new destinations by spending a few days in some other location on the return trip. Several years ago, we chose London. Despite the fact that we had only about three days for excursions, we managed to visit two botanical gardens. One was fairly small, called the Chelsea  Physic Garden on Hospital Road, which was established as the Apothecaries Garden in 1673. Plants there are grown in two different groupings. The first is by botanical family and the second, by their usage so, for example, those plants used for gastric disorders are all grown together.

But Kew Gardens — not to be confused with the neighborhood in Queens — is an extraordinary botanical garden covering 326 acres on the outskirts of London. Although the garden began as a private, royal preserve in 1759, it was transformed into a center of botanical knowledge and scientific research focused on finding new plants for food and horticulture particularly under Sir Joseph Banks  in 1772. I highly recommend the book “The Plant Hunters,” by T. Musgrave, C. Gardner and W. Musgrave, about these intrepid explorers.

We had one full day to explore the entire garden and I must admit that after about five hours, I could barely move. The first building that we explored was the Conservatory which is arranged in rows upon rows of flowering plants from tropical locations. It is always amazing to me that plants which presumably have no aesthetic  sense — or do they? — have flowers of extraordinary structural complexity as well as surprising coloration.

But today’s story is primarily about scent. I was walking down a particular row and the most extraordinary odor practically overpowered me. I walked down the row several times in an effort to locate the right plant. As you know, your scent receptors wear out rapidly for a given scent and so it took several passes with me sniffing each set of flowers until I zeroed in on the right plant. It turned out that it has the unpronounceable name Hedychium flavescens  (hed-i-kiyum fla-ves-ens) and is a member of the Ginger family (Zingiberaceae). It is known colloquially as the Cream Garland-lily or Cream Ginger. I decided then and there that I had to have one and instead of saying that I would, of course, remember the name, I actually wrote it down.

Returning to the U.S., I gradually started making inquiries about buying this plant. Much to my surprise, almost no one seemed to have one, although many related gingers are easily available. After several Internet searches, I found one nursery in California (which, unfortunately, has since closed) that did have some in stock. The proprietor said the plants were in dormancy but he would get back to me later in the season. About a year and a half passed, I figured out that this request had fallen through the cracks and I called again. The owner apologized and within three weeks I had the tuber and a list of instructions.

That summer I put it in the sunniest place I could find outdoors and it grew to six feet and put out two sets of blooms that were worth sniffing. But I wasn’t sure I could successfully overwinter the plant indoors. 

I know someone at the New York Botanical Garden and asked if they could overwinter it in return for an eventual cutting. A deal was struck, since they did not have this particular plant variety. At the end of last summer, my Hedychium had grown well again. I divided the plant, kept the smallest piece for myself and gave two back to NYBG as my gift where, I understand, it is being highly appreciated. Incidentally, I did overwinter the plant in the brightest room in my house and while it didn’t flower during the winter, it seems in fine shape for the summer season.

 Sura Jeselsohn lives in Riverdale.