California GArden Archives

FROM THE ARCHIVES

© SAN DIEGO FLORAL ASSOCIATION

These stories may not be published in any form or copied onto another media without written permission from San Diego Floral Association.

Reprinted from March/April 2023, Volume 114 No. 2

Roland Hoyt opened a landscape architecture practice in San Diego in 1928 and is remembered for work at Presidio Park, Mission Bay Park and the Salk Institute. He was an editor of California Garden and a frequent contributor. He often recommended specific plants for San Diego gardens, including this suggestion 60 years ago of the forest lily, Veltheimia viridifolia.  ~ Nancy Carol Carter  

April–May 1963  Volume 54  Number 2

A Forgotten Beauty

By Roland Hoyt

Veltheimia viridifolia is a bulbous perennial and a very old plant that has been known to gardens for considerably more than a hundred years. It was named for the Count Ferdinand of Veltheim [1741–1801], an early patron of botany. Why it has been neglected all these years in a country where good perennial species are at a premium, is answered only in embarrassment and with [an] awkward stance. 

Here is something of a spectacle. A cluster of bulbs in flower is always arresting, while the vivid viridian-green of the great, wavy, shining leaves, longer at the base and shorter above, accents the name derivation. They are a delight for coolness of vegetation and quiet warmth in bloom nine to ten months of the year. The leaves are somewhat fleshy and spread out in a handsome arc to form a rather tight mass. 

All winter they are firm and durable, but they sink into dormancy by early summer. They want moisture during growth, but the more thoroughly the bulb mass is allowed to sleep in dryness over summer, the sounder it will perform throughout the producing season. … The plants flourish in a fertile, sandy soil with added leaf mold or spent steer manure, although they are not at all demanding. The blooming will be longer and the foliage firmer in partial shade, again not absolutely required. 

It is not in any way an understatement to say the nursery trade is in dereliction of its obligation to the gardening public and to horticulture in general, when it passes by a plant such as this which is so easily, if not quickly propagated and brought to saleable size and which offers so much for so little attention. … 

FYI: Veltheimia bracteata. . .

. . . is now the name of this plant which used to be Veltheimia viridifolia. It is a South African native.

Photo: Rachel Cobb

Nancy Carol Carter is a widely-published historian, a Balboa Park volunteer, a Floral Association board member and associate editor of California Garden.

© SAN DIEGO FLORAL ASSOCIATION and © Nancy Carol Carter.
These stories may not be published in any form or copied onto another media without written permission from San Diego Floral Association.