Hi there JB.
And worse than the nurseries are the eBay sellers who will stick any old seed in an envelope. No guarantees there!
Best to stick with a reputable nursery.

Ok so here is my Venus plant that finally bloomed. It is actually white. I smelled it today and it smells like cantelope.
So at least the Venus smells but the Aphrodite doesn't. I also planted the Athens green one from seeds but mixed it up with my sweet shrub seeds so not sure which one is which until it has buds. I am not even sure if the Athens survived. I am just glad the Venus was in fact a Venus. :)

Beautiful. At least you got one that blooms. The VENUS I bought turned out NOT to be a Venus, which made me very angry, but it blooms and has no ordor.

JB that would irk me too. It's really annoying that you put time and love into a plant then to find out it isn't what you ordered. It's very frustrating.

Hurt's told me to send it back to them for a refund but the plant is like 4 feet tall and Hirt's expects me to mail it back? if anything I would have to hack it apart and send it back in pieces. It's very upsetting. as for right now I just keep it in the front yard until I find something better to take it's place. I don't think I will buy from Hirt's again.

Blankspace said:JB that would irk me too. It's really annoying that you put time and love into a plant then to find out it isn't what you ordered. It's very frustrating.

Hurt's told me to send it back to them for a refund but the plant is like 4 feet tall and Hirt's expects me to mail it back? if anything I would have to hack it apart and send it back in pieces. It's very upsetting. as for right now I just keep it in the front yard until I find something better to take it's place. I don't think I will buy from Hirt's again.

I have found them not to be very good about marking plants. I do not buy from them anymore either. They sell on Amazon now and if you buy plants on Amazon, be careful Hirts are not who you are getting it from.

Just have to chime in here and say how much I've enjoyed following this thread. I've learned some new things, and have enjoyed watching the progress on what everyone was growing.

Jonna--thinking of you and hoping you are doing well.

Linda

Hi Linda, I think we have all learned from this and I know I made some new friends. Have a great day.

@JB I am in the process of reading this thread and am on page 2. But I wanted to ask a question. You sent me several Sweet Shrub seed pods back in January 2016. I was wondering if you could tell me if this plant is a Sweet Shrub just by looking at the leaves? I put seeds in several jugs and put them outside on Jan 10, 2017. I later decided that maybe I should not have put them out in our cold temperatures so I brought them in after a week or so. I put them in my little garage greenhouse where they were toasty warm and a couple sprouted. I think this is the only one that survived if in fact it is a Sweet Shrub. I have more seeds so I plan to germinate more later. Also if this is a Sweet Shrub will it withstand our 5a winter temps in the ground here?

Sweet Shrub plant....with one eye I will let you decide if these leaves are the same





Sorry my vision is not that good just now. My new glasses are not here yet and I am having a real problem with close items. Hope this helps. As for the question about the zone, I am reluctant to say that these babies would survive that cold until at least they are a few years old. They are slow growers until they get good roots and even with our very cold weather here in NJ, I am not sure they would make it on a Zone 5...depending. This weather is so unpredictable now it is almost impossible to say. I am sorry for that.

@JB I can't really tell either but it looks as though the leaf stem is longer on my plant than it is on yours. I guess I will just have to wait until it gets bigger. Thanks anyway.

They're both good pictures- just taken at different angles...

Karen

It looks like the plant in question has alternate leaf arrangement?

All sweetshrubs only have opposite leaf arrangement.

Hi...
Hope you don't mind this intrusion...I was just lurking along when I saw this thread...Calycanthus is one of my most favourite shrubs to grow from seed....and I can say that...with almost 100% certainty that JB's last photo is indeed Calycanthus!

Jen

We already know that. It is gardenglassgems's plant that is in question.

I will take some more recent pictures of my questionable plants when I get a chance. Maybe tomorrow. Today is pretty busy for me.