'Pamela Malland'
Evergreen Azalea

"Look -- on the leafy carpet
Woven of winter's browns
Iris & pink azaleas
Flutter their gaudy gowns."

-Harriet Monroe
(1860-1936)

   

In April, the dark rose-red buds of the azalea 'Pamela Malland' open to dark pink-ringed flat flowers with large white eyes & long stamens. It is a low, spreading, twiggy evergreen, highly floriferous.

This cultivar was developed right here on Puget Sound. The grower of the specific specimen was Linda Malland, an Azalea enthusiast & one of the owners of Griswold Nursery in Kirkland. Linda's sister Garda Griswold was the original breeder of 'Pamela Malland,' naming it for her niece, in the 1970s.

I obtained for a client's garden a pair of sister-seedlings, the pale pink 'Orine Holm' (named for another of the Griswold sisters) & the dark rosy-red 'Pamela Malland.' There is a third cultivar from the same seedling group, the dark purple 'Dhabi,' named for Garda Griswold's cat, but I did not get one of those.

Though the flowers of 'Orine Holm' & 'Pamela Malland' are very different for color, they are otherwise similar shrubs. They were developed from a cross of 'Vuyks Rose-red' Japanese evergreen azalea, & R. austrinum 'Moonbeam,' a yellow Glenn Dale deciduous azalea. The individual flowers are twice to three times the size of the flowers generally seen on Kurume azaleas.

Despite that 'Pamela Malland' & 'Orine Holm' are sister seedlings (from sister growers!), the pale 'Orine Holm' does best in a bit of shade, while the darker 'Pamela Malland' can do well in considerable sun.

   

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