H. 'Guacamole'

We 'rescued' some Hosta roots from Costco a couple of weeks ago -that would be mid May '05- including some Guacamole ones. When I say 'rescued' it refers to being rescued from being thrown out. While I do not have any worthwhile pictures as yet, at least 2 of the roots have started to develop leaves.Hosta 'Guacamole' We had three different varieties in this "rescue mission" and it would appear that at least a couple of extra 'Revolution' roots are going to pull through, but the 'Twilight' ones look like a total loss at this point. Enough gas-bagging, here's how far one them has come in a short 2½ weeks.

Apparently this cultivar is part of the 'Fragrant Bouquet' family and 'Fragrant Bouquet' itself is supposed to be rather fragrant, so, we'll wait with baited breath.

Hosta of the Year This cultivar was selected Hosta of the Year for 2002 by the American Hosta Growers Association. To receive this honor the plant must be readily available in the nursery trade for retail distribution and meet the criteria for pricing, which is around $15 in the year of selection.

Hosta 'Guacamole'12 days later, June 14th, it doesn't look as if it's slowing down any. It appears as if we will have 3 roots actually developing for us, quite the successful rescue: 3 out of 3!

Hosta 'Guacamole'Here we are, all 3 roots. 2 in their own pot and one in the garden bed. The one in the bed -top, off-center right- is easily the biggest of the three. At this point they have all been growing for about 6 weeks or so and they're going gangbusters! It'll be interesting to see whether or not we'll get any of them to flower, you never know the first year.......At the end of June however there is no sign as yet of a flower scape in any of 'em. But hey, what's the hurry, it's only been 6 weeks or so since these roots were planted!?! Be happy they're doing as good as they appear to be doing.

Hosta 'Guacamole'

By the middle of August one of the three is finally showing a flower scape. Can't wait for it to actually flower and get a good whiff of its scent to see how it compares with the other scented one we had flower a little earlier, 'So Sweet'.

The rolled under leaf is where a spider built its nest....Notice how compared to the earlier pictures you can see a marked change in the intensity of the variegation.

Well, it's now almost mid September and the buds have opened. They are WONDERFULLY fragrant, from what I recall quite a bit more intense than 'So Sweet', the other fragrant Hosta we have. Hopefully next year their flowering period will overlap and we'll then have an opportunity to compare them somewhat better. If you have a hankering for a highly fragrant Hosta, this one, 'Guacamole', is an excellent choice! And on top of that, it's an excellent grower....

Hosta 'Guacamole'

This fragrant cultivar was selected Hosta of the Year for 2002 by The American Hosta Growers Association. To receive this honor the plant must be readily available in the nursery trade for retail distribution and meet the criteria for pricing, which is around $15 in the year of selection.

While it is not the most spectacular of Hosta flowers, it certainly makes up for that with it's fragrance!

All three roots have now been planted out to give them room to grow and based on their growth rate this year we expect more great things from them in 2006. Certainly we can look forward to them flowering sooner than they did their first year and it will be interesting to see if we get the same type of flowering pattern as we did from 'So Sweet' in 2005. That one saw flowers fairly early on the older growth and the new shoots for the year flowered much later, resulting in a very extended flowering period.

Hosta 'Guacamole'

Additional bare roots of 'Guacamole' were purchased in 2006 and I was horrified to see they are proving to be HVX infected, along with a number of other cultivars from the same source: Costco. Matter of fact it was on this new set of 'Guacamole' roots that I first noticed the classic HVX symptoms once the fourth leaf was starting to unfurl. Needless to say I'm keeping a close eye on the roots from 2005, they came from there as well and while it is not at all inconceivable that the viral infection occurred AFTER these were harvested, I obviously have grave concerns.

Hosta 'Guacamole'For good measure, here is a detail from the picture above to give you a better idea of what an HVX infection manifestation looks like.

Hosta 'Guacamole'As said, we're keeping an eye on last year's crowns and while it is easy to get paranoid, nothing has shown itself yet that can be interpreted as HVX. Having said that though, I couldn't help but notice that on 2 out of the 3 we have left that the leaves have gone dull, not shiny the way they were when they first broke ground and leaves going dull apparently could be a sign of HVX. A couple of them are busy putting up flower scapes, this is the one that's planted in the 'Hosta Nursery', where things are getting rather crowded actually Can't wait to smell that sweet Gardenia-like fragrance of Guacamole's' flowers again.

We'll keep an eye on them until 2007 at least. In 2006 we'll see if we can get some seed to set and on top of that I'll try a cross of 'Guacamole' with 'So Sweet', possibly one with 'Revolution' as well and keep our fingers crossed.

One of the three crowns from 2005 was not in a particularly good location, it got crowded early in the spring by some daffodils, plus the crown was really sitting a little too high out of the ground and then in early July it was trampled on by we suspect a racoon and it wasn't much of a decision to lift it and slice it up into 4 divisions. By late July some are a little slower than others to come around and start growing new roots and leaves but we're early enough in the year still so they'll be ready for winter with some judicious application of bonemeal and fertilizer.

A goodly number of Hostas are putting up a second flush of flower scapes in 2006, such as this 'Guacamole' for example. This was taken September 5th, 2006. It's curious to note that while the flowers on this scape have not opened as yet, the bracts are already drying up as an early sign of senescence, obvious signs fall and winter cannot be far off. It will be interesting to see how many buds we'll get on this scape and how many of those will flower. There in fact are two second flush scapes on this crown, both on shoots that developed this year. The main shoot has finished flowering for a while now and has a couple of pods ripening on it, including one fertilized with 'Revolution' pollen.

But alas, none of those seeds sprouted. I have a single pod on one of the plants in 2007, it's OP and next spring will tell the story.

By late summer 2007 it has become rather obvious that 'Guacamole' is a vigorous grower. This variety is now into its 3rd growing season in our yard and the largest plant we have is in the 'Hosta Nursery' and getting so big, it will have to get lifted from there, it's starting to overshadow too many others in there. I'll leave it until spring, at which time it will get divided as well.

For 2007 the plant in the 'Hosta nursery' has exploded: it measures 25"x38" and has 6 flower scapes on it by the end of August. It has also developed some nice variegation, as you can see from this picture, and while some of the older leaves are starting to show signs of senescence, new flower scapes are popping up all over. Again.

This is one of those 6 scapes mentioned above. I let Mother Nature look after things in terms of pollination and none of the scapes developed any seedpods. However, there is a smaller one I have in a 2 gallon pot that produced a solitary pod, which is ripening up nicely. 'Guacamole' and pretty much all of the fragrant varieties have a reputation for being difficult to get seed set. For us it's one pod on about 10 scapes in total this year and we had the same number of pods last year.

In spring of 2009 the large 'Guacamole' in the Hosta Nursery planter was lifted and divided. Last year it got so big it completely over shadowed all the 'Golden Tiara', 'Minute Man', one 'Revolution' and most of a couple of 'Hycinthina'. It yielded several good sized multiple divisions which have been given a suitably sized pot for growing on. The largest one is in a 3 gallon pot in the location where last year a 'Gold Standard' suffered from a heavy case of burn-out by mid-August, it's quite a sunny spot and it ought to do well in that location. I can already smell the flowers!

It's a little easier to spot in this picture, the damage to the front of the armrest you can see on the right-hand side of the picture. The chair had been 'modified' by the dogs and we'd been mulling over the notion of re-purposing it as garden art. And here it is.

By the middle of August the plant has filled out nicely and there are 3 scapes loaded with flowers and buds. The location it's in sees sun until around 2PM and that bright light has brought out a nice contrast in the variegation. We had a smaller 'Fragrant Bouquet' nearby and it was considerably different from what you'd see it like in the shade, though there was a degree of burn-out on it's edge variegation, something that was not a problem with 'Guacamole'.

Hugo's Database shows more information about this variety, including sports.

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Pages last updated 28 November 2018