Plant in a well-drained soil in full sun and irrigate only occasionally once established. A very hardy plant that supposedly can handle temperatures as low as to -22°F but best grown outdoor in USDA Zones 5 to 9 - we are hoping it will be just as happy in our Zone 10. Cut back plants after flowering. This plant should prove to be a nice garden or container plant with flowers attracting bee and butterfly pollinators and great for the bouquet both fresh and dried - dried flowers hold their color for a long time.

Limonium gmelini is a species with an extremely wide Eurasian distribution from central, southeast Europe to Siberia and south into Iran. The name honors Johann Georg Gmelin, professor of chemistry and natural history at the Imperial Academy of Sciences in St. Petersburg and author of the Flora Sibirica in 1752. The species is most commonly listed not unsurprisingly but apparently incorrectly spelled "gmelinii" (ending with a double "i") as it should be spelled with only one "i" at the end, as this was how the epithet was spelled when originally described, as Statice gmelini, in 1798 by Carl Ludwig Willdenow. Willdenow, a German botanist, taxonomist and founder of Phytogeography (the study of plant geography), apparently based this spelling on Gremlin having previously Latinizing his name to Ioannes Georgius Gmelinus and there are many other plants named for Gmelin that similarly have the specific epithet spelled "gmelini". Many modern nomenclatural databases continue to use the "gmelinii" spelling but note that the Kew database Plants of the World Online has it listed correctly as Limonium gmelina so we follow suit. This naming issue is also explained in the 2017 article The discovery, naming and typification of Limonium gmelini (Plumbaginaceae) in Willdenowia (47(2):99-106), the journal of the Berlin Botanical Garden and Botanical Museum (Botanischer Garten und Botanisches Museum Berlin).

The Dazzle Rocks cultivar was a chance seedling discovered by Peter van Steijn in a trial field in Voorhout, The Netherlands in July of 2012. Van Steijn had been seed growing Limonium gmelinii collected from the wild in Hungary for many years and then made selective crosses to develop compact plants with many more flower stems and this one was the result of such efforts. It was selected for its cold hardiness, compact plant size, flowers that are purple in color, a floriferous blooming habit and drought resistance. It was released in 2020 in Europe and thought to be a definite contender for the Plant of the Year at that years Chelsea Flower Show before this show was canceled because of the COVID pandemic. It was filed for Plant Breeders' Rights in Europe in April 2020 and received its U.S. plant patent PP33,240 in July 2021 and released into the U.S. horticultural market the following year. The pictures on this page courtesy of Concept Plants, who markets this plant internationally. 

This information about Limonium gmelini Dazzle Rocks ['STE10'] PP33,240 displayed is based on research conducted in our horticultural library and from reliable online resources. We also will relate observations made about it as it grows in our nursery gardens and other gardens we have visited, as well how the crops have performed in containers in our nursery field. We will also incorporate comments that we receive from others and we welcome hearing from anyone with additional information, particularly if they can share any cultural information that would aid others in growing it.