Down here the French buy hundreds of Pelargoniums each summer for their pots etc. If you were to tell them that Pelargonium is the correct name they wouldn't know what you are talking about. Geraniums they are and always will be. Even at the till the lady will call them Geraniums even if you correct her. I argued with her last year when I wanted to know the name of the Salvia she was selling, she told me Amistad, I said no it's not I grow Amistad. She said it must be because her boss said it was! More education need I think.
And don't get started on calling Crocosmia, Montbretia. At least with Pelargoniums they were called Geraniums at one time, but Crocosmia were never called Montbretia in any written description of the genus.
It really must be very confusing at times for, 'newcomers' to gardening. Many gardeners readily admit to being somewhat put off by the latin names etc. However I feel that much confusion perhaps be avoided or at least, reduced, if the botanical (latin) names, descriptions were to be used more.
Dove. Good evening to you. I have always considered you to be one who has a great deal of horticultural knowledge. YES! I totally agree with you, and your observations relating to GW. GW has become in a way, similar to the RHS. That being an authorative body.
Often we gardeners get our knickers in a twist, when the horticultural powers to be, suddenly chop and change the classification etc of plants. For ages now, well in my own case. For the past 70 years of my gardening experiance. This matter has existed. Time perhaps that a definite decsion was taken. Wikipedia gives a really excellent coverage. Well worth a read.
Personnally I treat the plants as such. Hardy geraniums..Cranesbills. Stragly but IMO very attractive.
Geraniums being the potted typical pot plant cum summer bedder.
Zonals. The above but with a darker center leaf marking.
Pelargoniums. Of the geranium type but with more frilly leaves and more attractive flowers.
Despit all this. Perhaps even for us in todays world, even the RHS at times confuses the issue.
I think the whole summer bedding thing is a bit generational and it is probably older gardeners who buy the masses of pelargoniums and other bedding plants. Perhaps companies like T&M are wary of alienating their core market for these plants.
You're probably right but I don't accept that as a fair excuse. It is really very easy for T&M to set up their website so that if you go looking for a geranium you get 'offered' both pelargoniums and geraniums (or put them next to each other in the paper version). If you search 'geranium' on the RHS site, you get both pelargoniums and geraniums in the search results. If they can manage it, I'm sure T&M could. Older gardeners who have been buying masses of them for years a) will surely know that they are called pelargoniums sometimes and b) will recognise the plants they want from the pictures. T&M don't have to catalogue them as geraniums. They can include "(aka bedding geraniums)" in their descriptions if they really feel they must.
But, as evidenced by this forum, it is poor customer service to continue to get this one wrong. If an enthusiastic novice buys a 'sedum', diligently looks up the growing conditions and plants it in the recommended soil and situation, they may be surprised to find it's grown so tall but they won't have killed their high-low-telephone-ium. Worst case, they come here and ask when is a good time to move it. The same person buying a geranium and following the correct soil and situation ('good plant for shade', 'happy in most soils that are not waterlogged') will at best not get any flowers and may well find their pelargonium dies. The old chap with his window boxes is not going to make the same mistake.
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”
Morning all, I'll be honest I don't grow pelargoniums or geraniums however I've had a very rubbish morning with a plumbing job and reading this thread has cheered me right up and made me think of all the lovely gardening that's to come this year.
I do struggle some what with all the plant names even to the extent of having a plant names wrongly for over a decade. Keep up the good work helping out us newbie gardener's Dovefromabove
It is amazing how many people who complain about using Latin names, already use them without realising it. From Alstromeria to Zantedeschia, there are lots of plants which do not have a well known 'common' name.
Mind Latin is a bit of a misnomer too, many of the plant epithets are Greek in origin.
Shed a tear then for poor old Antoine François Ernest Coquebert de Montbret who slashed and staggered his way through the tropics, on the orders of Napoleon, and found what was to become known as the the Montbretia. All that legwork, only for it to be subsequently obliterated from history by some Latin academic who probably never stepped further into nature than the gates of Hyde Park.
Apophthegm - a big word for a small thought. If you live in Derbyshire, as I do.
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But, as evidenced by this forum, it is poor customer service to continue to get this one wrong. If an enthusiastic novice buys a 'sedum', diligently looks up the growing conditions and plants it in the recommended soil and situation, they may be surprised to find it's grown so tall but they won't have killed their high-low-telephone-ium. Worst case, they come here and ask when is a good time to move it. The same person buying a geranium and following the correct soil and situation ('good plant for shade', 'happy in most soils that are not waterlogged') will at best not get any flowers and may well find their pelargonium dies. The old chap with his window boxes is not going to make the same mistake.
I do struggle some what with all the plant names even to the extent of having a plant names wrongly for over a decade. Keep up the good work helping out us newbie gardener's Dovefromabove
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
If you live in Derbyshire, as I do.