There are plants that are so captivating that I need to find them again when I have lost them. I got my first Thunbergia battiscombei at a Friends of the National Arboretum Plant Sale many years ago. I think it got lost when I moved.
I remembered this spring how well it had held up in the heat and I had to have it back. I found it at Kartuz Greenhouses and they sent me a small plant. I potted it up and stuck under the plant light, and it promptly lost its leaves, but sent forth a vigorous sprout from somewhere below the soil surface. After it got outdoors and experienced the full heat of a concrete porch in full sun in a hot Maryland summer, it grew rapidly.
I now can put words to my fondness for this plant. First, the color of the flowers. Not really violet, not really blue, but saturated. There's nothing quite the same color, and the deep yellow throat of each flower flaunts that particular shade of blue. The visual effect is cooling on the hottest day. The pod-like buds are really interesting, with their network of veins and hairiness. I like how the flowers burst out of them one day and are gone the next. And it doesn't vine like other Thunbergia species, so it is just tidier and needs less space.
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