It doesn't smell like much of anything. Well, if I stick my nose right in, I catch a faint whiff of something that smells like plastic.

Even worse, I think it's just me. My husband says he can smell it and that it smells like a really good air freshener.

What's wrong with my nose? I'm so bummed. I'll keep sniffing the blooms as they open this summer, but I'm starting to think I don't have the can-smell-moonflowers gene.

Just letting off some steam...thanks for your sympathy.

I never have blooms til Sept. I just figured it bloomed based on day length or something.

Just some aspects to consider...

I have sweet peas to console me though, blooming in lovely pinks and purples and they smell delightful - Old Spice variety.

October17: I started these moon flower seeds way back in February and had been growing them under lights for the remainder of the winter. By the time I planted them out, they were already a few feet tall. I'd read that if I want blooms all summer (here in my northern climate), I'd better start way early!

So, what I like to do is to plant other fragrant moonflowers, along with Ipomoea alba. For example, whereas the Japanese call Ipomoea nil, Asagao (morning face), they apply the name, moonflower, to a night-flowering gourd "Fugao" (evening face, aka Lagenaria siceraria) It has sort of a fruity smell. See http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Yoshitoshi_The_Ghost.jpg - How's that for a moody night vine?

An unusual 4'oclock has decided to keep coming back over our winters here from its tubers, as well as by self-sown seed - Mirabilis longiflora - looonnng tubes with little flares at their tips that smell of orange blossoms.

The scents of each of these are small to my nose, but together I get quite a treat. Hopefully next year I'll get Evening Stock (Matthiola incana aka M. bicornis) to start self-sowing over our winters and join the chorus.

Even if we can't smell these flowers, watching them unfurl around or after sunset is another treat to enjoy.

Karen

My nicotiana will definitely be back next year. I planted small plants that I started from seed and as you probably know, they grow quick. It seems for quite a few evenings if you went by the plants you can smell their fragrance.

Maybe that will be a good way to pass time this winter, researching fragrant plants on the internet for next year.

Glen

One thing about searching the internet for fragrant plants - it helps to know what you're looking for. I think I spent around $7 for Louise Beebe Wilder's classic The Fragrant Path. It's old, comes as a paperback facsimile and mentions tons of plants once common back in the late 19th to early 20th centuries, but many of which are unheard of now.

For one thing, many retailers are pushing recent hybrids, not heirlooms or species once common in our grandmothers' gardens. Armed with Wilder's book, not only will your internet searches be more fruitful, but you'll be able to identify these plants when they come up in seed exchanges that only give you a list of plant names in Latin, as well as look them up in HortPlex (spelling) or PlantFiles.

There are quite a few seed exchanges, but for starters, I recommend the North American Rock Garden Society (NARGS) - http://www.nargs.org/ . They say they prefer rock plants, but you can find a huge variety of plants there anyway suited to almost any kind of habitat or garden style you can imagine.

Apologies for being windy - hope this helps anyone who might not have known all this up until now...so many kinds of moonflowers and their companions

Karen