Tropicals & Tender Perennials: Tropical Gardens and Plants 108, 1 by dyzzypyxxy

dyzzypyxxy wrote:
Mj, you sure get up early! I had another thought about your brugs not wanting to bloom - Deb says they don't like too much phosphate in their food. If you've planted your brugs in the ground, your native soil might be too high in phosphate, d'you think? I know they mine phosphate for the fert industry in parts of Florida, and we learned that most soil here is naturally enriched with it.

Maybe if you kept the brugs in big pots and just sink the pots, then you can control the soil conditions better and it might help? Or make a raised bed for them with tons of compost?

My one old pink is in the ground, and it blooms just about once a month for most of the year unless it gets really cold. I top-dress it with compost every spring. Just planted Cherub in ground too, as it just got too tall to keep in a pot but I enriched the planting hole a foot out, all around it with compost and stuff. It's putting out new buds already, having just dropped the last batch of flowers. Btw, I do deadhead the old flowers off immediately, maybe that stimulates more bloom, too? I'm sure you do the same because they're not all that pretty once the trumpets drop off.

Deb's Monster still opening new flowers!