Yes. Plants definitely have ears. And many weed species have the gift of camouflage whereby they can take on the appearance of a nearby perennial so you can't see them.

In Sydney same as you are my osmanthus aurantiacus & orange supreme also have been planted in pots & ground for 5 years with no flowers at all. They grow slowly with some new leaves & twigs every year but have no sign of blooming. Maybe yours will have flowers this autumn ? The normal cream coloured flower osmanthus (osmanthus fragran as you called them) can easily & quickly flower with nice sweet fragrance but the orange / red colour osmanthus just are too slow to bloom. I believe they will eventually bloom we just need some patience. Hold on there. Oh I didn’t see your photo carefully: so your aurantuacus or orange supreme or both did bloom now?! How sweet, 6 years! Congratulations. The aurantiacus flower colour should be darker tending to redness, not sure about the orange supreme ’s flower colour. What is the one in your photo? Both the Aurantiacus & Orange Supreme I bought from ladybirdroses.com.au, I also bought a osmanthus labelled as ”orange colour flower” from canley vale nursary but that hasn’t bloomed either. Hopefully mine will follow yours to bloom next year.

BTW, how tall are your osmanthus aurantiacus & orange supreme that eventually bloomed? Mine of 5 years old are now around 1.6 metres in pot. I also have two in ground of about 4 years at shorter height.

Hi @Grant Yang (Sydney Australia) Yeah ones which bloomed were the Orange ones. After 6 years.

My mobile camera white balance is off.

They both are around 1.5 ish meter tall in pots.

They look pretty but fragrance wise I did not feel much difference from the regular Osmanthus Fragrans.

One thing is that all the flowers came on the old wood. So I can happily keep it pruned. Maybe it was the humid Sydney autumn this year which did the trick for these plants. I will be waiting to see if they bloom next year too.

Pretty sure yours will keep blooming every year from now on. Hope mine will do the same from next autumn. It seems orange / red colour flower osmanthus trees will take around six years to bloom after being planted in our city, as I heard from other people before and now from you.

Have a look of this osmanthus aurantiacus tree blooming somewhere in Sydney now(the narative is in Chinese), the tree must be many years old:

https://youtu.be/7hBlwhkU1QI

Hi @Just Started(Sydney),

Congratulations, your patience has paid off.

Flowers twice !! Currently both are putting out second batch of flowers.

Reviving an old thread. Happy to report that both the plants finally earned an upgrade in pot size. Also got a bit of root pruning. Both grew well and this year both have put on a good show of flowers. These pics are from the first batch. Now they are in second round of flowering.

This is the first time the volume of flowers was large enough to let the fragrance premeate the surrounding area. They smell like fruit. Like peaches.

Not as heavenly as Michelia Alba to be honest. Which reminds me that later this year, I have a difficult task of root pruning super sensitive Michelia Alba. It has out grown its pot.