H. 'Hanky Panky'

As you may have noticed by now as you're browsing my site, I'm always game to trade Hostas, be that with someone local or out of town or province. The trades I have been involved in have mostly been initiated on my part, but I have also been an eager participant in so-called 'secret trades' in one of the Hosta forums I frequent, Hallson's. Early August I contacted a lady in Brandon, MB, about doing some trading, and these are what arrived at my doorstep on August 14th. They were soaking in rainwater when I got home that day -Waita put each division in its own container with water from our rainbarrels- and after supper it was potting up time. Some were smaller than others and the largest of them is actually missing from this shot, it hadn't been potted up yet when I took the picture, I couldn't make up my mind what size pot to put it in. I was the lucky recipient of a total of 8 Hostas, 7 of which were new to me and a fair number of those were on my 'most wanted' list.

Of all the ones I received in this shipment, this was the smallest division/plant. There's not much to show as yet as you can see and this will be a nursing along project for the remainder of this growing season. This is one of the many sports from 'Striptease' and is the second sport of it we have received this year, 'Risky Business' is the other one.

It's now about a month later and as you can see there is a new leaf and the overall appearance is quite perky. All these cultivars you can trace back to 'Fortunei Hyacinthina' tend to be vigorous growers, and it sure looks as if this one holds to that. It'll be bigger next year, I have no doubt!

It's the last day of summer and this last leaf is getting bigger still and it gives a nice impression of what we can look forward to next year.

We're now into early May 2009 and this is what has shown thus far in terms of leaves on Hanky Panky, quite different from last year! I suspect part of the reason for the difference is that it has been sitting in pretty much full sun, I want to make sure it grows as much as possible. It sits in a tray with water to keep it constantly hydrated and shares that tray with a Risky Business and a handful of '08 seedlings.

By late June 'Hanky Panky' is starting to show the colouration on the new leaves again that you saw on it last year.

Just for fun, here's a 2009 Striptease family portrait. 'Striptease' is in the #2 pot top right, below it is the newest addition, 'Gypsy Rose', beside that on the bottom left is 'Hanky Panky' and top left is 'Risky Business'.

Update: the 'Gypsy Rose' is history. It showed signs of HVX in a couple of leaves, as is quite common for this variety by the sounds of it.

It's now early September and it's nice to see there are new shoots popping up. And those new shoots are developing leaves of a shape quite different from the earlier growth, never mind the colour differences. The new leaves are more what I would expect the shape of the leaves to be and based on the late season growth we saw last year I'm not surprised to see much more green in the margins of the new leaves.

For 2010 it's finally at a point where the leaves are starting to remind you of the shape normally associated with 'Hyacinthina' derivatives. The number of veins has increased, and it's showing good vigour. Not long after this picture was taken the plant was transplanted into one of the garden boxes, along with a 'Risky Business' division, to allow for more growth.