Heirloom scented geraniums, anyone?

These are some of my favorite plants.




They’re quite rare and very difficult to find in your local nursery or greenhouse. They come in a wide assortment of fragrances, including pine, mint, citronella, old spice, etc,

I absolutely adore the fragrance of roses, so I have been collecting the rose scented ones in particular.

Are they really heirlooms? I always assumed that they were selected hybrids.

PJ Diaz said:

Are they really heirlooms? I always assumed that they were selected hybrids.

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They’ve been around since the Victorian age, I believe. They used to be really popular because you could do all kinds of things with them, including adding a leaf of it to your apple jelly. (Roses and apples really seem to go well together, but they are also related.)

Scented pelargoniums were brought to Great Britain (plants from South Africa and seeds from Paris) in the early 1600's by John Tradescant, botanist and plant explorer for Charles I. England (at a time of rudimentary or non existent sewage disposal, monthly bathing habits and no such thing as air fresheners) was a pretty stinky place There was/is a distinction between geraniums and pelargoniums.