MYSTERY: What in the world is this flower?

Here’s another flower found at Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello.  It’s something you’d hear about in novels by Thomas Hardy and Jane Austen, but what it it?  Send your guess to editor@charlestoncurrents.com — and make sure to include your contact details (hometown, phone number).

Also this week, we offered the following photo:

In the foreground is a drooping red flowering plant that sounds absolutely Shakespearean — “Love Lies Bleeding.”  And that sounds just right, as the plant was spied at a place dedicated to lots of different plants by a Founding Father horticulturist — Thomas Jefferson.  His home, Monticello, is in the background.  Photo by Andy Brack.

• If you have a picture with which you’d like to stump our readers, send it along to editor@charlestoncurrents.com.