Blooker,

Welcome back to Southern California.

California Sunset and Desert Sunrise are amazing plumeria at Jungle Jack's, but there are a lot of other beautiful ones there. Check out Tiger if he has one blooming, TBred Tracy is a big bloomer. Have a great time checking out the blooms and let us know what you end up liking best.

Maybe you could call John and have him give you a tour with some suggestions on what to buy.

You are sooo very lucky! Please report back with your experiences and don't forget to take a camera, please. :)

I'm so sorry for you, blooker. You just might go into plumeria overload by going to JJ's. Please let us know if you make it back home in one piece!
Peg

lol @ Peg!

SimiDude: I'll add those to the list to look at. I have a feeling there will be too many varieties that I will lose focus. I spent the day reading this forum and it appears that some of the crowd favorites are divine and CA sunset so I'll def have to check them out.

I think the two plant I bought from home depot are dwarf singapores. (At least from what I read on some of the older threads on this forum.) They are from a nursery in Fallbrook and labeled plumeria rubra but looking at the plant and leaf shape, I think they look like singapores. The plants had either white or pink tags inserted into the pots. I bought one white and one that was missing a tag so it can either be white or pink. I believe I only paid $6 each because when I got home and looked at my receipt, the clerk charged me for 3 gardenias when I only bought 1 gardenia.

Hopefully I don't get plumeria overload so quickly.

You are so lucky to live that close to the nursery! I live states away and will unfortunately have to have mine shipped to me.
Anyway, here is a list of my favorites from them:
- Divine (miniature)
- Tangerine Dreams
- Scentsational (STRONG fragrance)
- Star White
- Fire Storm
- Aztec Gold (Peach scent)
- Tiger
- Gina
- Macarena
- Delightful (I've heard nothing but GREATNESS about the fragrance)
I don't own any of these, but I do love the pictures of them. You can also search around for better images of them on the internet as well.

Seedlings are so fun to watch grow and they grow fast. Well, it seems that way to me. However, you will have to wait an average of 3-8 years to have one bloom. Although I have seen some posts on this forum of people's seedlings blooming in one year. It will take three bloom cycles to know the final color and shape of the flower though. The coolest thing though is that a seedling is not a variety - it is a new one that you get to name!
Here's an example of changing blooms: http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/plumeria/msg0812401421956.html

Glad you're loving plumerias! It's a fun obsession, haha. Don't forget to visit their website if you haven't done so already. I'll leave a link just in case. Have fun!

Here is a link that might be useful: Jungle Jack's

Nauticalcoasts, thanks for reminding me - Firestorm is awesome. Great color, scent - and the flowers even look cool after they've faded!

I didn't see Aztec Gold on JJs list - did you mean maybe Inca Gold? Blooker - if you can find Aztec, it's a great one. A number of plumeria smell like peach - this one smells like PEACHES AND BUTTER!! You may find yourself licking this one's petals, lol.

Tiger is striking - pink flower with what look like tiger stripes coming down from the sides. I regret I didn't get this one! Really unusual and beautiful.

Rhonda has a great scent, Scentsational can knock you out with its great scent, and Gina is a really beautiful flower that lasts for days when picked. Divine is a big big bloomer (of small flowers) - best I think in warmer weather when the pink shows, but beautiful either way.

Best of luck, but mostly I hope that a lot of flowers are blooming when you go, so that you can actually see and smell them!

I just got back. I ended up getting a Divine and CA Sunset. I almost grabbed a J105 but I wasn't sure if I liked the blooms. There were no J105s in bloom so I couldn't tell based on just internet photos. I think I was saved from plumeria overload because many of the plants were not blooming. There were a lot of plants.

I also visited another Vista plumeria grower named JD. He had over 4,000 plants.

Here's Divine:

I can't remember the name of the woman working but she was pulling several of the 2 and 5 gallon blooming plants for the Plumeria Festival next weekend.

CA Sunset was on my wish list and was blooming during our visit. I grabbed this smaller 4 tipped non-blooming one. I am attracted to small plants. The other Vista grower also had CA Sunset and Penang Peach. I liked the shape of the CA Sunset bushy tree he had in the ground. He told me that CA Sunset and Penang Peach were the same. I believe I read that CA Sunset is a seedling of Penang Peach so although similar, they are not exactly the same. Many of his plants were not marked.

The other Vista Grower I visited also had an impressive collection and a large hot and humid greenhouse. I picked up this large Celadine for $10. He was having a special on his white plumerias.

I also got this Nebel's Rainbow cutting. Hopefully I don't kill it.

I don't know how to upload more than one picture at a time.