Rhododendron auriculatum

A very welcome event happens each July in our garden. A great white rhododendron with a magnificent scent blooms in the back garden. Rhododendron auriculatum, with loose trusses of huge white flowers with pale green throats, showy red bracts, and long leaves, is much awaited here. The scent wafts along the path to the Japanese temple bell.

This Chinese native plant is a veritable tree, with a six inch caliper trunk. If the poor thing had not had some very disastrous pruning in the past, it would a magnificent tree now after 35 years. We moved it, about a decade ago, from a window well where it had been chopped and mutilated and under-watered. Now, in its new location, some form has been restored to the plant and it has rewarded us with beautiful and deliciously fragrant summer flowers.