Truetropical, very healthy plants, good find. Hoping that last night was our last freeze, and that spring is finally here.
Palm-leaf begonia.
Tropical Garden #7
Hi Candela
This orchid you have is an Oncidium, it grows in many gardens here usually as epiphytic, flower stalks are long to form and bloom but then you will enjoy flowers for weeks on! Beware, snails love those stems, they ate all mine this year.
JJ
Hi Fred,
Yes, Reunion is just a tiny dot in the Ocean, most people from France do not even know where it is...we did get a bad epidemic two years ago, the Chikungunya virus was propagated by mosquitoes and it just was awful, hundreds of ne cases each days and quite a few death but it is gone now.
JJ
were getting that cold weather yall just had tonight..... All the plants are in the GH w/ a heater so they keep on growing. Its stayin at a nice 72 in here. Bletilla orchid about to bloom as well as ti plant. I got a phoenix sylvestris for Easter, and he's also in here in the GH.
Hi Placenciarita:
Thank you for the compliment. Your plants are beautiful also.
I enjoy being able to garden year round here. Our cold days (cold for us anyway) are some of the best gardening days. Those are the days that I like to do heavy gardening chores, e.g. making planting holes with my trusty pick axe! LOL
Truetropical77:
You have some beautiful plants. What's the name of the plant with the white/silver leaf?
delecie hello, how are you ?we met at the harley poker run in key west. nice photos especially that chenille looks like you are feeding it steroids. i can't believe you have huge mangoes already i have a glen and it is just blossoming.
jj thanks i was begining to think maybe it wasn't going to open.
true tropical i have never seen an alocasia/colocasia (not sure which it is) that long and narrow. nice
bletilla ochracea i found this blooming today!
wow,is that a ground orchid?
yes, but this particular species i think is relatively new in cultivation
Hi candela, I'm well thank you! How are you and Carlos doing?
The Chenille plant looks pretty decent now but a few months ago it was pretty scraggly looking. With all of the rain that we had over the weekend I think everything will really perk up now.
I used to have a Glenn mango also but I removed it last year. Wilma uprooted it in 2005, then an unknown creature began taking huge bites out of the fruit and my neighbors son would sneak over the fence and take the remaining fruit. I finally gave up!
My mother has her eye on the largest mango. Since this is the first season that the tree has had fruit this early, my mother has volunteered to eat the large mango when it's ready to ensure that the other mangos are safe to eat! LOL! She lives in Miami Shores but she'll drive to Homestead for that mango!
Delecie, thanks for naming Plectranthus tithymaloides in your photo. It's a plant that grows native in my yard here, and I've never known what to call it. ...er, I guess I still don't know what to "call" it, since I can hardly pronounce Plectranthus tithymaloides, but I know what it IS.
From my experience, it's a handy little specimen that transplants very easily and grows in all kinds of different lighting and soil conditions, and "plays well with others".
delecie
you will have to visit sometime when you visit your mom i am just next door to her.
Candela,
you say you have a glen mango. I looked them up and see them to be somewhat pear shaped. I wonder what kind of mango I have. Any ideas? Mine are obviously way ahead of your blooming glen. Yesterday I bought a 100 ft rope to try to tie the branches together to give the heavy hanging tree some support. The landscapers keep knocking fruit down as it hangs low into the lawn and I knock more down as I get to close on the driveway. I just hear the banging of the fruit on the car. I just don't expect them to be where I used o drive. :-)
Fred
delecie, Truetropical plant with the white/silver leaf is a alocasia Corozon.
Check out my new trailing begonia plant.
fred the only reason i know mine is a glen is that is what the label said. yours are pretty small still. do you eat them green or wait till they are ripe? alot of people eat them just before they ripen with a little salt. i prefer them ripe.if you bring a mango to fairchild tropical gardens or a picture of one during the mango fest they can usually tell right away.this is a picture of mine last year.
candela, Truetropical plant with the long narrow leaves is a alocasia lauterbachiana.
Here is mine from last year.
How long will you have to wait until your mangos are ready to eat?
rita your trailing begonia is nice but i find my eyes wandering all around your picture to see all your plants. lovely
candela , you are the one that got me hooked on begonias, I keep looking for new ones at the nurseries.
anthurium
diehrdsouthrnr, great find on the Bletilla ochracea, may it grow and reproduce for you.
blooming today
Candela,
I don't recall EVER eating a mango. Last year my tree had about 6 of them. When they ripened we weren't here and my neighbor ate them. He claims they were delicious. This year my tree runnth over with the fruit hanging down in the grass and on the driveway. I think they ripen in August and I may again not be here then. We'll see.
Fred
LOL JPlunket! "Pedilanthus tithymaloides" is definitely a mouthful! You're right about the lighting conditions. Although it grows well in full sun and shade, I like to grow mine in full sun so that it develops the pink color.
I would love to see your gardens candela. I'm still tidying up my gardens but hopefully they will be ready to receive visitors soon. In your photograph are you growing both Odontonema callistachyum and Odontonema strictum? Is that a Megaskepasma erythroclamys (Red Brazilian Cloak) to the right of your photograph? My Red Brazilian Cloak looks pretty ragged now. It used to grow in the shade of my neighbors trees but the trees were blown down by Wilma. It now grows in full sun and it doesn't like that! I've been thinking about removing it...I've taken a few cuttings and I may attempt to plant one in bright light but not full sun. I don't have any shady areas where I can plant it and let it grow naturally.
Thank you for the plant id Placenciarita. I "second" what candela said about your plants. They are gorgeous!
This is a photograph of my ragged Red Brazilian Cloak:
This message was edited Jun 10, 2008 7:50 AM
This banana shrub has flowers which gives off a wonderful fragrance.
Because the mango was not in season when we were at Braveheartsmom, she had frozen some from the year before. OMG. Wonderful.
Christi
fredrump...I'll be more than happy to drive by in august and take the burden off your neighbor and eat the mangoes! :)
Mary,
how about some grapefruit right now? Or oranges? My neighbor has privileges. He also watches my fish. :-)
fred
delecie i have three different colors of firespike the lavendar, red, and fucia. i also have a red cloak. the red plant to the right of the mango is some sort of red shrimp (i have no idea of its proper name it reminds me of the pink justica or yellow baleria.)
rita i love begonias especially the rexes but do not grow any because they are hard to take care of. i stick with the rhizomous because they are low maintenance.
fred i would love any citrus because we have none in dade county because they came and cut down everyones trees because of citrus cancre
cassie
Here's a nun's orchid claiming some sun.
and an orchid orchid wanting some attention too.
every tropical garden needs it's orchids. This is my outside orchid house where I just finished installing a misting system and getting the necessary water to it. On the right are mostly divisions. I have many more to do but ran out of potting medium. I thought I had plenty but the bigger pots are very hungry for such stuff. I find that most of my orchids started out in very small pots and are crying for more space.
I still have to finish my potting shed and then I should be done with such things for a while.
Fred
I have another orchid I need to show you. It's a vanilla orchid ready to bloom
The sagos are almost becoming extinct in Florida because of scale. From the web: Cycas revoluta, one of the most primitive living seed plants, are very unusual and popular ornamentals. A rugged trunk, topped with whorled feathery leaves has lead to the common name "Sago Palm", however it is actually related to conifer and Ginko trees - all cone bearing plants which trace their origins back to the ancient flora of the early Mesozoic era. Often called "living fossils", Cycads have changed very little in the last 200 million years.
Whatever is happening these ancient palms are dying off as people are not spraying them to help them survive. I do not agree with the featured advice to immediately destroy an infected plant. The cycad pictured here was a poor yellowed remants clinging on to life when I bought this property. My wife said to get rid of it. Being that there were various such half dead plants and trees on the property I kept it to give it some loving care.
This is what the common wisdom says:
Ornamental cycads (Cycadaceae) in South Florida are highly infested with an introduced armored scale insect from Southeast Asia. Horticulturists and pest control personnel in the area report that common methods of scale insect control with systemic insecticides, contact insecticides against crawlers, and oils have not been effective in reducing these infestations.
Affected cycads are almost completely coated with a white crust that gives the appearance of a layer of fine snow. The scales suck all the juices out of the leaves, and the cycad dies within a few weeks. At this time, this type of scale does not attack other kinds of plants, only Cycads.
If you have purchased Cycads from Florida nurseries (which ship all over the U.S. so they might have shown up in your favorite garden center too), please watch for this scale. It multiplies at a fast rate and can spread to other Cycads in your collection. The only remedy at this point is to destroy the affected plant immediately.
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I use both an systemic and an oil spray (organocide) and was able to eradicate the scale. It's in the air so I repeat this process two or three times a year and the sagos are healthy. This applies to both king and queen sagos.
Fred
I have this creeping, crawling leathery fern climbing up this sabal palm. It has very solid woodsy runners which slowly climb up the tree. I know I planted it but one buys these 'assorted' ferns not really knowing what any one of them are. Can anybody id this fern?
This message was edited Mar 26, 2008 3:52 AM
These bromeliads were taking over and climbing into my lawn outside of their assigned boundaries. They are very spiny. It's not easy pulling a brazilian pepper or other weed which somehow manages to grow in their mids. These broms carry water in their crown and have tiny little blue flowers. Again no idea as to name.
fred
This pitcher plant, along with various orchid cacti and other plants, was given to me for my 70th birthday recently. Never had one before. (people know what I want for my birthdays)
The plant was in a small pot which I quickly repotted so it could expand a bit. It is now thanking me for the room. The plant is a bog native and is one of the 70 different Nepenthes 'monkey cups'. It is a native of Southeast Asia and Australia, forms pitchers (cups) that hang from trees. Its pitcher relies on a pool of water to trap its prey. It has a most unusual leaf that first looks like a normal leaf, then develops a tendril at its tip, and finally the tip of the tendril develops an amazing pitcher. It gains support by twining the tendril around another plant. The trap lures its prey into the pitfall trap by a combination of decaying odors and sometimes a red coloration. As the pitcher develops, it swells and droops due to its weight.
As it matures, it suddenly begins to inflate with air. Once inflated it begins to fill with liquid, then opens, revealing the enticing interior. The top of the trap has a lid that initially covers the pitcher until growth is complete. When the leaf is fully grown, the lid opens and the trap is ready.
Kind of neat to watch this process. Anybody else have one in their garden? Mine is under an overhead sprinkler which also keeps the various ferns, including the staghorns, in the background happy. There's even an orchid in the live oak.
A tropical garden is what I had always dreamed of having one day. Life is good even though I woke up early today for some unknown reason and reverted to my plants even if it is on the computer. :-)
Fred
This is really the picture I wanted to show.
Hi Fred!!! Can't sleep either? Absolutely gorgeous pictures!!!! I just love you gardens!!!!
this orchid is well established on the sabal palm but so far I've not seen it bloom. It's been there for three years now. What gives? Or maybe I missed it when not here?
Hi Jeri,
what else is there to do right? My wife complained about being sick last night and I think I worried about it to the point where I woke up. All kinds of thoughts go through one's head at the point of sickness. Or maybe because she couldn't sleep, I couldn't sleep. She feels rotten and I can't do anything about it. Hopefully it's just a virus of some kind but she never gets sick. That's why we're in Florida. :-)
Here's an orchid in a forgotten pot in a forgotten spot. Another one like it I carefully kept with my other orchids and it died on me. I guess they like neglect better.
This message was edited Mar 26, 2008 8:37 AM
Part of my shade garden
