This was perhaps my favorite pink seedling out of all the ones that bloomed this year. Gorgeous rich colour and heavy substance. Not quite what I was expecting from these two parents.
The flower on this sib was rather unremarkable when it first bloomed but the scape which you can see in the next image is what really caught my attention. Both sibs had been moved to a selected seedling bed in late 2004. This year (2006) saw the scape on this one really struts its stuff. The scapes were at least 30" tall, much taller than its sib and each scape had a couple of laterals that were about a foot long each! So maybe what I saw in the scape on its first bloom is starting to mature. While the flower is ordinary (you can see the sib in the background in this image) you have to know that the genetics for pink with gold edges are still here. I have been crossing it with other edged pinks hoping to keep the plant habit and improve on the flower.
The scape is what really caught my attention here. This is a first bloom seedling and out of one of the nodes on the scape there are 3 separate branches while on the opposite node there are another 2 branches. Each of these five branches started at the scape and were not branches off of branches. Further up on the scape there is another 2 lateral branches plus a top branch. While I am reluctant to call this 8-way branching on a first bloom seedling, I'm not sure how else to describe it. I would be interested in your thoughts! I'm anxious to see what it will do next year!