Night Blooming Cereus

About five years ago one of the members of a local Garden Club here in Macon, of which my Bride is also a member, told us about a beautiful flower that blooms for only one night and is a lovely flower. We were told it was a Night Blooming Cereus. We were able to attend a late night garden party after she called us to tell us that the flower was in full bloom. Of course she shared several cuttings with us.

Our two plants have been growing and we bring them into the garage every Winter. The plants are potted and thrive in the shade. On July 21, 2009 I noted small buds forming on the edge of the leaves of our plants. The pictures below give you an idea of how this flower develops. Note the date and time of the image at the bottom of the picture.

Not only are these flowers lovely to look at, they also have a lovely fragrance. We had one flower on the night of 31 July 2009 and had friends and neighbors over to enjoy it. Then on the evening of 1 August 2009 we had eight flowers bloom. We started watching the flowers open at about 9:20 P.M. and the flower watching party did not end until Midnight.

If you desire more information about the care of this easy to grow plant may I suggest that you perform a search on the World Wide Web and look for organizations that are Land Grant Colleges. They appear to have the most reliable information. You can be sure that I will be sharing cuttings after the potential of a late September 2009 flush of blooms is past.

In summary a delightful flower and one that you will never forget. Now to show the complete the full cycle of this bloom please be aware that I will make an additional post to show what the bloom looks like on the morning after it's full beauty.