THE LILAC ZONE (Now being updated again!)
The incredible hues found in 'Thunder Cloud' florets!
A bloom of 'Thunder Cloud' the year it was first discovered
2025 Update!
An enormous panicle of 'Thunder Cloud'!
In 2025, two exciting things happened. First, one of the grafted specimens of this open-pollinated seedling flowered for the first time, which is always fun to see. There is something about seeing a second specimen of a very rare cultivar in bloom that is so satisfying, perhaps because it is a concrete visual validation that it has been successfully replicated and is one less step away from ceasing to exist. Second, some friends of mine and I got to see the parent plant in bloom again. Unlike in 2022 when it had only produced a couple of blooms, this year it had produced quite a few, allowing us to observe many more attributes, such as the potential size of panicles, abundance of florets on a single panicle and the hues exhibited on the florets ranging from the bud stage through the waning period. We also noticed that because of the tendency of the petals to curl inward somewhat, one can see the lighter backside of the petals, causing them to look somewhat bordered with a lighter coloration and causing a slight two-toned effect. All of these observations further confirmed that this "volunteer" seedling was an incredible discovery and cemented the fact that it should be named and replicated further!
This was a fun discovery during the 2022 trip to Highland Park. A volunteer seedling was blooming
in the middle of a documented cultivar located at the park. The bloom was so different that it was clear that what a friend of mine and I was seeing was not a sucker of the parent plant. We noted how spectacular the bloom was, with white near the eye in each floret and mutually agreed that this new lilac should be monitored further to determine if it might be worthy of being given an official name. (Not all lilacs that have been given names originally were a product of intentional hybridizing. Some highly impressive cultivars have actually been open-pollinated seedlings that were selected for their high merit and given an official name!)
This winter, scions were collected of this lilac, courtesy of one of my friends that lives fairly close to Highland Park and grafted by my grafting buddy so that we have can have additional copies of it already underway, should we decide that it be worthy of a name after another couple of years of continued observation. If it is deemed worthy, we agreed that due to its darker purple coloration, we may consider calling it "Thunder Cloud"!