ann baker

Ms. Baker has grown quite a bit in the last year (see 2009 and 2008), and is now making a shrub 2-1/2 feet tall. The plants around her are not too happy about the room she is taking, but I'm okay with that. She is now blooming full force, and like all other cistus, the flowers last only a day, opening an hour or so after the sun comes up, and the petals falling about 4 pm.

The entire show is repeated daily, with many buds waiting for their turn on stage. Overall, it lasts about 2-3 weeks, which isn't long, but longer than many spring bulbs.  The rest of the year, the shrub is clad with attractive leaves and is care-free. So even without bloom it is worthwhile.

And although the flowers are what brings most people to these plants, it is the leaves which makes it truly memorable. It's not that they are so attractive, though certainly not un-attractive. It's that they smell so delicious. Not edible-delicious, but a kind of exotic delicious that you just want to wallow in.

My friends at the Albuquerque Botanic Garden say that they have never had problems overwintering various forms of Cistus. In my neck of the woods, in the foothills of the Sandias (probably at least a thousand feet higher in elevation), plants are more chancy. I've lost a half dozen varieties to winter cold, including the vibrant pink C. purpureus, and the enormous white flowered 'Bennet's White'. Although C. ladanifer and C. x aguilarii and C. 'Ann Baker' have survived, grown, and performed nicely, they do suffer from winter damage, showing their displeasure with brown leaf edges. Even they needed some winter protection the first year or two.