Is that tapioca? I was given a tiny one a few months ago. Wow it looks beautiful!
Three of my Black Magic's were $4 each. The other three were in one pot for $47. They saw me coming! I guess its all a wash!
Tropical garden #8
candela, that will make 3 new plants that are new ( for me) that you posted this week, my list is getting too long., they are all so pretty.
Delecie, great buy, they all look so big and healthy. I bet that you are walking around with a great big smile on your face. I bought a red mandevilla at Lowes' last week for $20.
I do get some good buys from time to time.
Shadowpaige64507, that is really a beautiful iris, so delicate. I will be going through the mail order cathologs this fall trying to find it.
Terichris, yes, it is tapioca
Thanks for the Welcome.
Shortly I will post some of my gardens....hope you enjoy.
Hap
Candela,
sagos are dying all over Florida from the scale. I use organicide oil spray and a systemic to keep the scales in abeyance. This particular king sago was ready for the plant heaven when I bought this place. I brought it back which is why I'm so proud of the enormous growth of the plant. Makes me feel like a good guy to have around. Plants can say thank you too. :-)
Today I spent the day potting orchids but the smell of my jasmine and the gardenias finally made me get the camera but it doesn't have smello-vision. The garden club that was here the other day kept wondering how I get such an abundance of bloom and no aphids on the gardenias. I had no answers except that I talk to them. :-)
Here's a nice threesome
and a single bloom
You just have to Love Mid April...I look in my garden and suddenly everything is exploding, blooming or growing- Plumbago, Bouganvillia, Bird of Paradise, Indian Hawthorn, Coco-Plum, Firecraker plants, Elephant Ears. Love them all!
I spent yesterday and today planting 200 Caladium bulbs in my front entry - Whew that was a workout for the old bones. However, if they come up as they should...it's going to be a spectacular display...If not, I'll have a stick garden, as I marked them with bamboo skewers, just so I knew where I planted them! hehe.
I Love Caladiums. The ones I planted last year are coming up again amazingly and multiplying. They're one of those good old stand-by's when you want color in the summer when everything else has kind of expired.
Pic: Last years Caladiums that are starting to come up again...
Beautiful Caladiums in a Pot...
I'm not sure how many of you ever read or subscribe to "Florida Gardening" Magazine. It's a real good publication and I really enjoy the articles as you can actually relate, as I can actually grow the plants they feature...
I was looking through the Feb/Mar issue the other day and just had to laugh at an article entitled "Anole Angst"...
It was a letter to the Editor from a Lizard...
He said he was mad as Hell and is not going to take it anymore! Some of his reasons were...
1. I am not here for the perverted amusement of your Cat.
2. We are not here SO your children can make us bite their earlobes and wear us as earrings.
3. We are not here to save you money on your car Insurance! hahahaha
The Anole compares himself to us Humans...He considers himself a very gracious and regal lizrard species that inhabits all of Flordia.
He also thinks he's not so different from us humans, his points are...
1. We molt frequently and shed off pieces of skin. Humans continuously forget or refuse to use sunscreen and end up doing the same.
2. We grab and consume prey almost as big as we are. Lizards have seen your so-called Sno-Birds at a Sunday afternoon all-you-can-eat-buffet....need I say more?
3. We breed anywhere from late March to early October. You breed anytime, anyplace.
He further states that if he should get into your home by accident and is spotted clinging to the wall..
They are NOT amused by being chased around by some crazed , hairy brute of a Susquatch with a piece of Tupperware, while the mate is doing a River Dance on the couch screaming....Eeeeecck...It's a lizard! For crying out loud...do you know how BIG you are???
I thought the closing was the best though...
The Lizard writes...
What really frosts me about you Humans...It's when you refer to your politicians and attorneys as "lizards" What did we ever do to deserve that?
I just thought it was cute!
Pic: I have hundreds of these little guys running around inside of the screen enclosure. It's never a problem. They drive my dogs nuts but I like them!
That article is hilarious KatG! Thanks for posting it. I'll have to show it to my friend Kathi whose teenage daughter had a "lizard incident" on Saturday evening. While Kiersten (the daughter) screamed, Kathi picked up the lizard and placed him in her garden. LOL
Your caladiums are beautiful also. You must be a superwoman to plant 200 bulbs! I'm still tired just from walking around in Lowes yesterday and loading and unloading all of my goodies!
Kat,
your pots in the lanai are as beautiful as last year - maybe nicer. I still have to plant half of the caladiums I bought via the co-op. The ones I did are already coming up. Shows you when I get around to things. The old ones are not spreading as I thought they should except in areas where they are surrounded by ferns to cover the ground. They must not like bare ground but like to be moist. I see you have bark mulch. I just have pine needles which don't seem to be enough or something else is wrong.
As to lizards - I always wondered what they ate until I saw one snatch up a large ant yesterday. I don't know if they also do fireants for dinner but I suspect those fellows know how to protect themselves. They sure aren't afraid to attack me. :-)
Yes, it is wonderful outside, isn't it.
Fred
I hate you Florida people! lol! beautiful beautiful gardens you all! : )
Interesting about the Anole lizards. I had never seen one before this year in this area- except at the nursery where I learned that the lizards are being imported from florida with the tropical plants the nurseries . They are finding this area quite agreeable and are starting to spread. I've found my first one in the garden a few weeks ago. That puts my lizard types total to 4 types now- gecko, skinks, chameleon anole, and now that little cuban anole.
Funny you mentioned, I saw a pretty lizard today in my garden. No idea which type though...
Some of the gardeners here say that the cuban anoles are chasing out the local ones, but I really find that hard to believe as the cuban anoles habitat is mostly on the ground, whereas the chameleon are mainly in the branches of shrubs and trees.
Hey robcorreia we love you too! :-) Since we're in the same zone, your garden must be as beautiful as Florida gardens. I'd love to see more photographs of your garden so come on and post away!
My first Osteospermum bloom:
Guilty of #2....we do infact make them dangle from our earlobes for fun when out of town relatives are here,lol....
i grew up with those here in sc... guilty of almost all of those things, except the screaming riverdance on the couch and tupperware. i just catch 'em with bare hands
my orchid finally opened. i just hope the flowers last as long as it took for it to open.
and this one is still blooming
Beautiful blooms candela!
candela, your orchids were worth waiting for, will you show a close-up of the flower?
Those gardenias are just perfect, wish that we could smell them too. I have a gardenia plant at my home in Belize but the blooms are much smaller.
KatG, I have enjoyed your pictures for quite some time now on the container gardening forum, while lurking. I always start at the container forum to see what you have new, then I go to the Mid -south to see Lily-Love and then to the Tropical zone to see what Tropicman has blooming, I miss him
I am always entertained by those little lizards, they are much nicer to have around than those pesky Iguanas.
My plumerias are starting to bloom ,still in the GH.
Plumeria Dwarf singapore pink.
My plumerias aren't even thinking of blooming. Just leaves. I guess they are all late bloomers. :-)
I do have a beautiful vanda up in one of the plums which is now saying, 'hello world, look at me'.
Fred
well, a little closer gets you to see the vanda a bit better.
Well, I don't have any open fields here where the sun comes from all angles during the day. There are always some trees in the way at some point during the day. The plumerias bloom during the summer so they must get enough light then. I have some new ones (sticks in the ground from last summer) in sun just about all day but they will probably not bloom right away. They don't even have a full set of leaves yet.
When I get more organized here, I'm going to find some open and sunny spots on my new property but there won't be any water there. We'll see if I can get this right one of these days. Right now my main concern is my orchids. I think I need to get RO water or lots of rain water instead of what comes out of the ground for them. They are not happy when I compare them to orchids other people grow. So it must be the water,
Fred
GM Fred,
What is RO water?
I don't know how your ground water is, but I would opt out for that before tap water....too much chlorine. Of course, rain water it the best.
Hap
Hap,
GM = Good morning?
RO = Reverse Osmosis.
The problem with ground (well) water, in these parts at least, is too much Sodium and Calcium Carbonate (all that limestone). I've pretty much neutralized the Calcium but the salt can't be removed except by a reverse osmosis process. Every orchid grower I know of has huge tanks of water which has gone through some salt removal process to benefit his orchids.
Yesterday I went to see Jade Orchids here in Naples and they showed me their water system clarification process. The owner found out a long time ago that the salt content in his groundwater was killing his orchids over time. He now even has a backup RO system in case one should fail. Everything we see down here in the Southern part of the state was under the ocean until about 6000 years ago. There is lots and lots of limestone which formed over millions of years which makes up Florida. At one time, about 10,000 feet deep, various land living creatures lived. They are all covered with this limestone stuff mixed with salt from the sea.
From a geology of Florida: "The calcium carbonate which makes up the rocks associated with carbonate platforms is produced by various organisms which live in marine environments. When the tiny animals that live in coral reefs die, the reefs (made of calcium carbonate) may be preserved as one type of limestone. Some varieties of seaweed (algae) have the ability to secrete fragile skeletons of calcium carbonate. When the algae die tiny crystals of calcium carbonate fall to the sea floor and form carbonate mud, or lime-mud. This carbonate mud is preserved as another type of limestone. These are only two examples of the sorts of organisms which construct calcium carbonate skeletons as part of their life cycle. If a carbonate platform is to form, these carbonate-producing organisms must be able to grow prolifically. The water in which the organisms live must remain shallow, since some of them require light to survive."
Anyway, the water we extract from under our gardens is full of all kinds of chemical components which orchids aren't used to. They are epiphytes who clung onto trees and received their moisture from the sky and from evaporation of rain water. No artificial water from below or man made is in their genealogy. :-)
So the orchid growers try to reproduce what the orchids like which is water mixed with only minute elements other then H2O. The reverse osmosis process produces water which is actually too pure and growers reinject minerals to approximate what nature provided.
The other problem is a sinking water table because of human consumption which tends to bring the nearby ocean into play. Water gets saltier as we approach the edge of the water. Here in Naples we are not all that far from the Gulf of Mexico.
I really found out about all this salt after I had sodded most of my 2.5 acres with zoysia and it didn't grow at all like the grass I saw on the sod farms further inland. As a matter of fact, the more I watered it the worse it got. Checking with golf courses as to how they get their grass so nice revealed elaborate water systems which modified their available ground water via acid and fertilizer injections. My lawn is coming back now that I have my own acid injection system. I also found out why everybody has Floratam St. Augustine weed grass on their lawns in Florida. It doesn't care about salt and it's roots barely touch the soil but spread above it.
Here a picture of Florida just a little while ago in earth time.
Fred
i went to fairchild for the bromeliad show and couldn't resist.
i love the pink on this one
a skin colored one
i love all the pastel colors
and lastly
oops one more time
Thanks so much for the info, Fred. I wonder if my lake, which water's all the plants including my orchids, is bad? They seem to be doing quite well. I will have to have the water checked.
Yes, GM is good morning...
Cass, you are going to have to get a second job!!! Them's is beautiful.
Hap
Wow...this thread has the some great looking pics. Here is my garden. I just installed a drip irrigation system today....it was getting a bit laborious to water all the plants every day.
here is my hoya fungi
my read vanda.
my baseball bat sanseveiria from last year
the plant
