She's about to open!
Queen of The Night Buds.
Lily -- I think I will have three blooms opening tonight. We were in Colorado the entire month of July, and we came back to about 12 spent blooms. We always miss a few, but manage to be here for some.
If not tonight, surely tomorrow night.
Hello JeanK, has it been a year since we last talked (typed). We shared some bloomed on this forum last year I believe. Whoa, I've 6 buds and 5 of them are about that same stage as yours. Be back with pix tonight.
Wonderful. These things are magical! Will look for your pix tomorrow.
At sunset, or there about this evening. JeanK, hope it has been a good year for you.
At this hour, the flowers are about to open fully.
By about 10:45pm central time. The flowers were happily in full glory;
I stayed up late just for the occassion. So I wanted it to last. lol, as a result the flowers were brought indoor.
Beautiful. Three of mine opened last night and filled the sunroom with their wonderful fragrance. Will try to download some pics later today. It was hard to get pics of two of them as they were at the back of the plant and close to the sunroom windows.
They're delightfully fragrant. I've one more flower yet to open. Looking forward to seeing yours. Have a good day JeanK.
Is this similar to the night blooming cereus you see growing on the lava rock walls in Hawaii?
I'm not sure if it's the same LeawoodG. It's also known as night blooming cereus. Epiphyllum oximatum, I think.
Here is the pf for the NBC. Sorry of the mispelled above. http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/2443/
I'm sure this is the same plant. I was so impressed with seeing them in bloom along the road at night on Maui we stopped the car and got out to take photos of thousands of blooms along the walls surrounding people's gardens.
LeawoodGardener: That must have been some sight!
Lilly: I stayed up Sunday night until the wee hours of the morning on Monday, watching and trying to photograph, so last night, I did watch the last two open, however, got to bed much earlier! It is really hard to use a flash in the sunroom as it is all glass and you get a reflection.
10:30 Sunday Night.
As you can see, this one was facing the window and I didn't even consider going outside and trying to take a picture through the window since I saw the pigmy rattler a few weeks ago lying beside the steps to the sunroom, plus the fact I didn't want to endure the chiggers -- just call me a wimp! This was about 11:30
Another one facing the wrong way.
Monday, 9:00 p.m. (Central)
10:30 Monday night.
10:40 Monday night.
Show's over. The day after the night(s) before.
Jean, you've done a great job on photographing those. Thank you for staying up all hours to get the pics. and turn around and shared 'em with us. Hah, on the topic of the pigmy something, I gathered a poisonous snake? I'm with you on that one, ain't goin' there. lol.
Leawoodgardener, it must have been some experience!
I could be wrong, but while Epiphyllum oxypetalum is often called 'queen of the night', as is the night blooming cereus, I think they are two different plants. Night blooming cereus is a large upright desert cactus, while Epi. Oxy. is a epiphitic jungle plant. It all comes down to that "common name" problem. Both are grown around here, and I saw a beautiful cereus ( with many collapsed flowers) in my travels today. Both have large, fragrant white flowers at night, adding to the confusion.
Hmmm. Maybe I mistook what I saw in Maui as the wrong plant. It was not an upright plant - it grew along a low wall (no more than 3' high) - leaning into the rocks and crevices for support. I wish I could lay my hands on the photos we took that night - but this was back in the days of 'film' instead of these digital wonders we all use now.
Whatever we call it, it's beautiful and each year I eagerly await more blooms.
Lily: BTW, the pygmy rattler is a poisonous snake.
Oooh yike! We found a King snake down the basement the other day. Fortunately, I haven't seen much of the poisonous kind here.
If there is one thing I don't like it is snakes, especially if they are close to the house, but we live in the woods so we have all sorts of critters. Right now the deer have eaten almost all of our hostas and anything else that hasn't died from the drought.
Have a good day, Lily.
You too Jean, enjoy your day.
We were away last week-end and the one bud we had opened while we were gone. I have counted 25 buds so far, and we are scheduled to be away again the week-end of the 10th. I am keeping my fingers crossed that they will open either before we leave or just after we return. These plants like to bloom when we are away.
Awww, it's too bad they happened while you were away. I had another that made two buds. Something happened, and they both fell prematurely.
I'm hoping they bloom just before we leave on the 8th. DH has a new camera that he wants to try out on them, so if we miss them, both of us will be disappointed. A couple of the leaves have three buds on them, so they should really put on a show.
Best of lucks Jean. I'm looking forward to see your photos of the blooms with your new camera.
Here are a couple of fuzzy pictures taken at the wrong time of the day, but you can get an idea of how big the buds are.
Do you think I might see them open within 10 days?
Jean, those look quite big, but not big enough to open in 10 days. I don't think. But than again, it's just a guess.
One of these times I'm going to try and catch a bud when it's about the size of a pinhead and MARK it and see how long it takes to open. Can't you just see us saying, "I'm sorry we can't attend your birthday party because we are waiting for our epi to bloom?" This time we have to be away for a 75th wedding anniversary. I don't think we can skip that!
Jean