‘Blewbury’
by M.J. Harvey – May 2002
In her kind review of my
March talk on my hairy hybrids, Margaret deWeese attributed the origin of R. ‘Blewbury’ to me. I would love this to be true but it
isn’t. What I was attempting to say was
that in the UK this dwarf hybrid has gained acceptance because of its compact
habit, small shiny leaves and tiny golf-ball sized trusses. These characteristics fit it perfectly to
the British pocket-handkerchief front-garden.
It is an example of a deliberate cross between two dwarf species to
produce a slow-growing plant whose foliage is as important as its flowers. This is also the aim of my own breeding
programme. I was trying to say that I am
not entirely crazy.
The name ‘Blewbury’, as I
said, is designed to drive North Americans crazy since the word sounds like the
fruit blueberry but it isn’t. The
equivalent wild fruit in Britain is called bilberry or blaeberry. Blewbury is a village about 20 km NW of
Reading in Berkshire (pronounced ‘bark-sh’, the English are very vowel
challenged). I suspect that the breeder
came from there but have no evidence to prove the idea.
The ancestry of
‘Blewbury’ is roxieanum x anhweiense. These are both small-leaved, slow-growing, compact species and
the hybrid inherits these characteristics with just a kick of hybrid vigour
which makes it easy to propagate and hence commercially attractive.
R. anhweiense is a member of Subsection Maculifera and I don’t
use it in my breeding programme because it is only slightly indumented. But it is a dwarf species with
frost-resistant flowers. I just
arbitrarily cut it off – I had enough on my plate as it was.
R. roxieanum is an even more compact species with narrow or very
narrow (var oreonastes) leaves which
have a thick brownish indumentum persisting underneath. There is a hint in the literature that the
extreme elepidote R. proteoides is just an extreme dwarf form of roxieanum,
or is very closely related to it. The truss of roxieanum is very small,
about 3-4 cm diameter. Thus the whole
truss can be placed inside a single flower
of, say, one of the Loderi hybrids.
Hence, what I call normal hybridisers have never considered it for use
in any commercial hybrid in North America where bigger is better.
‘Blewbury’ was probably
made some time in the 1950s because it was shown at an RHS show in 1968 where
it received an AM. The exhibitor was
Crown Estates, Windsor. I should
explain the etiquette associated with royal estates. The name of the person who actually raised or showed the plant is
never given, those in the know, know, but the public doesn’t. I suspect that Eric Saville, later Sir Eric,
then in charge of the world’s most fabulous rhododendron species collection at
Windsor Great Park, may have had something to do with it.
Greer, in Greer’s Guide
to available Rhododendrons, rates ‘Blewbury’ at 3/4/3. That is 3 out of 5 for the small,
pinkish-white flowers; 4 out of 5 for foliage which is small-leaved and
healthy-looking; and 3 out of 5 for general performance. The ratings given to plants are a bit
arbitrary and, like beauty, very much in the eye of the beholder. Anyone who prizes rapid growth and big
flowers is going to downrate its flowers and performance.
Other hybrids bred for
indumentum include:
‘Teddy Bear’ |
degronianum
yakushimanum x bureavii |
‘Golfer’ |
degronianum
yakushimanum x
pseudochrysanthum |
‘Ken Janeck’ |
degronianum
yakushimanum x (smirnovii?) |
‘The Porcupine’ |
degronianum
heptamerum x makinoi |
All of the above have
larger flowers than ‘Blewbury’ and are more acceptable in a north American
context. I am trying to get away from
using yakushimanum because of its fade-to-white flower-colour gene. I find that its related subspecies heptamerum
is producing some very promising offspring especially with roxieanum, pachysanthum
and pseudochrysanthum.
As I keep saying, this is
just a quirky hobby of mine. Some
people don’t like their Rhododendrons hairy at all. I was humbled many years ago when I was showing a group of seniors
around the Dalhousie University greenhouse.
Going up to a particularly nice plant of yak showing its young leaves
white with hairs, one gentleman raised a trembling finger “we’ve got a problem
here, mildew!” I attempted to explain
the concept ‘indumentum’; I failed. He
was unmoved. “I know mildew when I see
it.”