You are naming fragrant plants and reporting no scent. I think it is a matter of variation in noses, rather than plants. Any Syringa vulgaris cultivar (the only kind many people are aware of) should have a substantial aroma, some of the other lilacs being less pleasing but still having some smell.

If you were there on a cold, damp day there would likely be less perfume than during better conditions.

I'm doing the same thing. I have a double lilac colored lilac that doesn't have much smell, went around a nursery on Sunday smelling lilacs and couldn't find any had improved flower color and classic scent. I remember hearing that if it was fragrance one wanted, one should get the common unimproved variety.

Ron! I didn't know that you could be wrong! Some varieties of white lilac are known to be unscented. They're fairly common around here; at least, so the nursery tells me.

Nope. I love lilac and I have a sensitive nose. I had my face right in them. Nothing. The viburnum - which I've 'heard' people report having varying degrees of scent - had very little scent.

It was a cool, damp day. Are you saying fragrance can be suppressed, or simply that it doesn't waft (which wouldn't matter, since my nose was in the flower)?

Anyway, I want to avoid the white lilac error and am looking to know what lilac is best for scent.

I smelled some 1 gallon pot-sized, white lilacs that were on the weak side this week, too. But no scent at all? Really?

Really. Nuthin'. I wave 'em in people's faces in disgust. Well, they smell like a *plant*, but there's no lilac smell. I have a friend who has one, too. Nada. They grow into big trees, too. Mine is over 20' (unusual, but it had to fight with a big rhodie for sun) and *should* waft into my second story windows very nicely. I keep climbing the tree, just to be sure, much to the embarrassment of my teen.

Hello!
I just went out and sniffed my lilacs, which are normally very highly scented (purple kind), and they didn't have much going on today. I THINK they don't smell as much when it is cold and damp, as it is today. When it warms up, I can smell them inside the house.
I have lots of starts if you want to grow some!!

Heather

The ordinary (unimproved ones) we had growing in Calgary when I was a kid were superb. Can't seem to find anything comparable out here. I'll be watching this thread to see if anything turns up.

Oh yes, I bought Lilac President Grevy many years ago, it is still languishing in a too-small pot. When it does grace us with a few blooms, they don't smell all that great.

Just a thought...Were the flower heads fully bloomed?
I notice that I only get that wonderful fragrance when the heads are in full bloom.
I have what I'm sure is a common variety. It was planted over 30 years ago. About 5 years ago, I added another lilac on the opposite corner, and it's not quite as fragrant as my "old" one, but it's still smells nice. Slightly larger individual flowers, and a touch paler in color than the old one.

My various purple varieties have no fragrance on a cool day, but once it warms up look out. Very rich heady perfume. I have a single white and a double white, neither of which have any fragrance to them. But they are pretty so I keep them. The old fashioned speies lilac is the most fragrant in my opinion.

Anyone in the Woodland, WA area should check out the Hulda Klager Lilac Festival - We really enjoyed it last year and I got a new variety for the garden too.

Mike

Lilacs are not extremely fragrant at all times, but what do I know?
I remember happening upon fragrant lilacs & I know the smell is really wonderful!

I kind of wonder if it does have something to do with the cooler damper weather here, when we were on the Prairies, the lilacs fragrance was incredible, even if there were only a few blooms on the shrub. I haven't noticed any lilac fragrance at all since I've been here.

The best time to smell things is when it is warmish, and very slightly damp. The particles that you inhale that are translated as scent rise and are stable in warmer moist-ish air, too hot/dry and they dissipate, too cold/wet and they can't rise. Think of beer. An ice cold beer doesn't really smell (or taste) strongly. If it is room-temperature, it has a much stronger smell and taste.

Aside from temperature, the different lilacs in my neighborhood certainly smell differently. In my yard, the neighbor's overhanging lilac practically knocks me over. Mine, which is a smaller plant overall, has a weaker scent and its a little different. Lighter? less cloying? Hard to explain. Down the street, there is a row of lilacs out in front of someone's house. They are all different, and some have more scent than others. The med/dark purple flowered one smells the most. Not much scent on the white one.

I was chatting with two master gardeners about lilacs - I mentioned that my old white one (allowed to grow tall so that I could enjoy it from my second story window) has little to zero fragrance. One of the ladies said that she has NEVER met a white lilac with a fragrance. So another vote against white lilacs...

My viburnum has been wonderfully fragrant this year. Even picked some blooms to bring in the house.

I'll report back when I find one of these utterly scentless Syringa vulgaris for myself. Don't wait up.

I have two lilacs, a VERY fragrant white and a not-quite-so fragrant purple. The white is about 20 feet tall, perhaps 10-15 years old and began blooming near the top about a week ago. This week, in warm sunshine just after the rain, the scent was strong enough to knock me over. When we cut branches to bring indoors the scent intensified and is so strong that the perfume fills the house. The purple is a younger plant, perhaps 4 years old, has not yet offered up much scent but it's a lovely color. For many years I lived in a house where my bedroom windows were open to the overwhelming fragrance of a 30-ft, 50-year-old white lilac hedge. If I could have dived into that scent, I might never have returned.

Here is a link that might be useful: Lilacs with Fragrance

There's a double white lilac at the fragrance garden in Ferndale that knocks my socks off. Been meaning to go snag a cutting for a long time. Now roses...there are very few I can smell, regardless of the weather conditions. People around me oooh and ahhh over fragrances I can't detect at all. This topic will have me sniffing the neighbors shrubs for weeks, I'm sure.

Several of the lilacs I have planted are listed as "slight" on the webpage SeattleSuze posted for us. I havn't had any of them long enough to know for sure... most havn't even bloomed yet. Too young. However, I doubt I will lack lilac scent here, as I am planting a LARGE/LONG hedge of lilacs to block the view of my neighbor's yard in the summer months... or rather, to block his view of mine! They are common lilacs which are usually highly scented. I imagine that with the couple dozen I will have when I am done planting them no one will doubt I have lilacs! I'm back from the road, but I bet that hedge will be seen from the road without much trouble. Too bad my neighbor will likely get all the compliments!

If any Canadians are still looking for lilacs, Van's Farm Nursery in Ladner has acres of them, all in bloom now. They have at least 20 different varieties. They are having their annual open-to-the-public sale this weekend, until Sunday. (I think they are normally a wholesale-only operation.) This is a great place to sniff them all, all at once.

Here is a link that might be useful: Van's Nursery

My 'Krasavitsa Moskvy' had one bloom (it's still a very small plant) and it had a nice scent. Not Strong by any means, but a nice lilac scent when you stick your nose in it. It is a very pretty white, and was listed as "slight" on the fragrence page. Certainly noticable.

My President Grevy also had a nice scent on it's single bloom also. Nothing I could smell from a distance, but a typical lilac smell all the same. Hard to judge what these two will be like when they are larger and have more flowers though.

They were the only two of my lilacs that were big enough to bloom this year. I had hoped that "My Favorite" would, as it is a fairly big plant, but I just planted it this year and it must be too soon. It is certainly bigger than 'Krasavitsa Moskvy', which was in a gallon pot since last year and is very small.

Many years ago when I lived in Rochester, NY I went for three weekends to the park where they have hundreds of lilacs growing and sniffed and looked. Somewhere I have my notes on the prettiest ones with the nicest scent. I can confirm that there are large variations in fragrance for lilacs of all colors. The ones I eventually picked out were 'Krasavitsa Moskvy', which I see as a pink bud that opens to a double white flower; and 'Mount Baker'which is a pure white. Then I had to move and shipped them to my mother in Sequim. She's had a lot of bloom from the 'Mount Baker'; but the Krasavitska only blooms when she has an exceptionally cold winter.

I have a book about lilacs I got from a thrift shop. It said that Mt Baker could be so covered in blooms that you could hardly see the foliage. Nice to hear nice things said about it, as it is one I want. How is the scent on it? I figure with a name like Mt Baker I had to have it. If I didn't have this very large 4200 ft hill in front of my yard I could see Mt Baker. Just up the road folks have a lovely view of it.

I don't specifically remember the scent, but it was an important part of my choosing the ones I did--so I must have liked it!

My Mom says that it is a bit of a slow grower, she thinks it has so many flowers that it can't grow as fast. It bloomed from a very early age, when it was less than two feet tall.

Well, this turned into quite a thread. I have it on good authority (misslemonverbena) that flowers aren't interested in fooling around int he cool weather, a nd just sit around in the flora version of sweats and slippers - basically what ell_in_OR was saying - so I waited for a warm day before I bought. I ended up buying a Miss Kim on a whim.

I've always meant to go visit this lilac garden in Woodland, Washington - they have a festival and sell plants, national historic homestead

at least go visit the site, you can absolutely smell the lilacs when you look at the page:

http://www.lilacgardens.com/index.html

that's the place to discover the most fragrant lilacs - my birthday flower, I can just imagine burying my face in a huge bunch and just breathing, breathing.... ah!

I was touring the garden of a local hybridizer of various kinds of plants, who informed us that scent was recessive in lilacs (perhaps in other plants as well) and easily bred out. His white lilac had the least scent of any I smelled there, practically none.

It is true that not all Lilacs are fragrant and also true that cold weather does not bring out the best scent.

I was a florist for over twenty years and even heavily scented flowers did not smell when in the cooler they have to come up to room temperature. It is also true that the oils that produce fragrance make the flowers more fragile or last a shorter time which is why so many modern roses and other flowers grown for cut flowers don't smell nearly as good as old fashioned ones or garden ones. They are bred to stand up to transport and sale not for fragrance. They are trying to breed the fragrance back in though.

Anybody have a trick for keeping lilacs from wilting so fast once cut, ends crushed and in a vase with plenty of water?

I'm one of the complainers that my white lilac has no scent. Well, finally, I got to smell it! The hot weather really brought out the scent. Evidently, just 70F doesn't do the trick. Also, this is the first time in almost 20 years that I noticed the scent of lilacs in the air as I walked around in my neighborhood.

Also, when I came home Saturday (air temp almost 90F!!!!), I smelled my fragrant camellia for the very first time since I planted it 12 years ago! Burying my nose in a bloom didn't help, but I noticed the fragrance as I walked up my front steps. I had planted this camellia there on purpose, hoping to greet guests with a lovely fragrance at my front door.

I guess we just don't normally get warm enough in the Spring for these plants to be fragrant.
Daphne in Tacoma

Many years ago, when I used to live in Rochester, NY, I went to their big lilac park for three weekends in a row and wandered around sniffing all the various lilacs to decide which ones I wanted to plant. I probably still have my list of favorites somewhere (I do remember being disappointed how difficult some were to find); but the three I remember (two because I got them) were Krasavista Moskvy, Mount Baker, and Evangaline. KM is particularly lovely with pink buds that open to white. Mount Baker my Mom has here in the PNW and it is always covered in white blooms. Evangaline is one I didn't have, but I think it was quite old-fashioned and had smallish blooms in large trusses.

Here's a nice pic of KM http://www.bluehillcountrygarden.com/bom_lilac.html

Wow, this thread is way old but I'll add that smashed the ends of woody stems is NOT the correct thing to do despite Martha saying it is. Cut them with a sharp knife or sharp shears. The Flower Council of Holland proved that smashing woody stems does more harm than good well over a decade ago but everyone hasn't gotten the memo yet.

Mt. Baker does have outstanding fragrance and a ton of blooms.

Photo I took of it last year at the Hulda Klager lilac garden

3 or 4 years ago I bought a 'Michael Buchner' (S. vulgaris) lilac. It was the last one left in the nursery & was on sale...not the most beautifully shaped bush, but the double 2-tone blooms and the fragrance were stunning. Once I got it home, it became an issue of "where to plant it?!" Long story short, it has lived in its nursery pot until yesterday! It hasn't fared especially well, but gives me a few bloom clusters every year. Some grass got a really good hold in the pot, so I ended up dividing the plant and think I managed to get all the grass out. The largest division went into the ground...right or wrong, the place was picked...decision made! There are a few buds already forming. I potted the remaining pieces, hoping that if I should move in the next few years, I'll have a good piece of this lilac to take along. I haven't found many pics of this cultivar online, but here's a link to one. I'm thinking 'Mt. Baker' might make a good "neighbor" for my lilac.

Here is a link that might be useful: Lilac 'Michael Buchner'

Mount Baker also has excellent resistance to mildew and excellent summer foliage according to an evaluation conducted by the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum. I read this in the book Trees and Shrubs for Northern Gardens. It's also hardy all the way up to zone 2.