Tropaeolum hookerianum
Gastil Gastil-Buhl (Tue, 11 Mar 2014 16:17:38 PDT)

Welcome Tom,

My Tropaeolum hookerianum is blooming for the first time on 2 year old seedlings, just opened yesterday. The mother plant, from Telos Rare Bulbs, was quite a cloud of purple when it bloomed, but it has stopped emerging. Tropaeolum tubers do that sometimes. I sent seeds of these to the PBS exchange last year and if the bees do their work I'll be sending more seed this year. But 2 years is too long for you to wait for your paintings. So if you would like to refer to my photos I would be happy to share. I take far too many photos, some very close-up and sometimes with a grid useful for drawing. I admire botanical illustration. Let me know what sort of photos would help most.

Here are some photos from past years:
http://flickr.com/search/…

This one gives a sense of the small scale of these flowers, with a fly in one:
http://flickr.com/photos/gastils_garden/…

- Gastil