On Mar 24, 2:09*pm, (Una) wrote:
wrote:

If anyone wants to know whether they'll go to a good home, my mother
lives in the suburbs of Cleveland and has a rather woodland-like yard,
with several trees and some rhododendrons.

That sounds reasonably suitable, but this is a difficult garden plant.
Site selection is very important.

I received one as a gift a few years ago and was stumped where to put
it. *Nowhere on my property did I have a site suitable for it, if the
instructions that came with it were to be believed. *I did the best I
could but the plant died anyway.

Hm. I've been reading about site selection, and Mom has spots that I
think should work--shaded by deciduous trees in the morning and by a
building in the afternoon.

Most plants being sold in catalogs now are supposed to be a hybrid of
the North American native with a cultivated asian relative.

Really? Some of the companies seemed to be quite clear that they were
selling both the native species and hybrids. For instance,

http://www.hillsidenursery.biz/orchids.htm

So they
are not taken from the wild but on the other hand they may yet have a
negative impact on the endangered native.

Interesting thought, which I hadn't seen mentioned anywhere. I'll be
careful to get something clearly stated to be the species.

This plant isn't endangered on the national level, but according to
the Forest Service, "almost every state" where it occurs lists it as
endangered or threatened.

--
Jerry Friedman