8 datura blossoms opened at once (well, I blew most of them open just for the fun of it) next to three clusters of that So. American tobacco blooming.

It's odd though. The fragrance gets really intense around midnight for a couple of hours but it lessens after that I noticed on a still evening.

Datura looks a lot like brugmansia but the flowers point up or sideways instead of downwards like brugs.

It doesn't seem as sensitive to heat and lack of rain and grows readily from seed.

I think I mentioned this last year that the datura that sprung up in my garden was from a stray seed from a plant I put in 3-4 years ago. Lost the plant among a heavy growth of elephant ears ..never even noticed it.

The flowers give up at sunrise, wither and fall off so this is an evening plant I'll continue to use around the porch for fragrance. It makes round,spiky seedpods about 1 1/2 to 2" in diameter that split open when mature and dump the seeds in a pile under the pod. Might be of interest to birds since I can't imagine having umpteen baby datura growing in the same location.

The tobacco has funny seed pods in that they are like cups full of seeds that fall right under the plant. Hundreds and hundreds of miniscule seeds. Perhaps most of them aren't viable..one would hope.