Madeira!!!

Hey all,

Sorry for not blogging for an AGE, I can't use the fact that it's been a busy Summer as an excuse because I've had a couple of months of it off, but there's definitely been a lot of thinking and a lot of stuff on my mind! (Sadly not about the garden, mind!)

Anyway...just a quickie, I'll get around to doing a few update full length posts soon, but just thought I'd give you all a link to the youtube video I did with pictures of our holiday to Madeira this Summer. Hope you enjoy it, I did!!!

Madeira 2009

Will be back soon with more blogging ;)

'Grand Marnier' Progress Report :D

Hey all,

You may remember that back in late February I purchased a Brugmansia 'Grand Marnier' from Hill House Nurseries, along with a Begonia Luxurians;
Well, on June 12th, the first flower popped outta the bud after a good few months of agonisingly slow growth!!!
After another 4 days...*waves magic wand* the first had grown and was bursting to finally show it's beautiful self to me;
Well, after having grown to flowering stage after a few months, he deserved a reward, and was put in a larger, roomier and nicer pot for his debut flowering;
And...after another 6 weeks, of which not a single day has the plant been without a flower, he looks like this;
I'm very pleased with this buy!!! The order was primarily for the Begonia...but I think the Brugmansia turned out to be the best! The flowers are prolific, large, start out pale yellow and darken to orange (particularly during that hot spell we had a few weeks ago), and have the most gorgeous smell ever. During the mild weather we sat outside many evenings and the scent wafting over was wonderful. Am so happy to have my Bruggie flowers back :D

Am kinda dreading how he'll look when we come back...he's getting quite large for the pot again already, but I don't want to pot him on until next Spring at least, because they like to be kept a little pot bound. But this means that the water gets sapped out of the pot very quickly. We've got a watering system up and running on the Bruggie, plus a few other things, so fingers crossed that'll be enough to keep him going!!!

We're off to Madeira!!!

Hey all,

Hope you're well. Just to let you know that, by the time you're reading this, we'll either be on our way to, or in, Madeira for a two week holiday!!! This post has been scheduled to appear just as our flight leaves, so bon voyage!!!

At typing this at 8pm the night before and have yet to do any more scheduled posts [or packing for that matter!!!], but if I get some time I'll try and do one or two to come up while we're away.

I'll be taking plenty of pix so check back in a couple of weeks to see those!!!

I've been looking forward to this holiday loads, Madeira is well known for it's vast array of tropical flora and fauna so I'll have the camera in front of my face half the time! That said, it's also gonna be a major time out from the way I've been doing things for the past few months, and I'm not sure whether that's good or bad. But hey...I'll be coming back to it all in two weeks.

Right, am off for two weeks of sunshine and warmth!!! Have just checked the 15 day forecast and the highest temp forecast is 29C and lowest (including nights) is 19C, along with lots and lots and lots of that yellow disc in the sky, so it should be lovely, especially considering that, as I write this, we must be in our millionth hour of rain today, it just hasn't stopped.

Speak to y'all soon ;)

I'm Here!!! With Garden Update Pix!

Hey all,

First of all, sorry for not having blogged for so long!!! It's just been a mad few months. The computer decided to pack up on us and we feared that all 13000 photos from the hard drive were lost!!! However, HUGE thanks to a cousin who is very knowledgable in computers, we managed to get them all retrieved after a few weeks of anxious waiting. In the mean time, we finally got a laptop and wireless internet, half out of need and half as my birthday pressie!!! So during that hot weather we had for a couple of weeks it was lovely to sit outside with the laptop instead of having to sit in a tiny room all day long watching the clouds go by out the window...

Add to all that kafuffle a mountain of exams at school, as well as the intensive watering the plants needed until a couple of weeks when we finally got rain, and you've got an instant recipe for being over half way through the year without even knowing it's started!!! Because of having exams, I've had basically an extra 6 weeks of Summer holiday as well, which have already passed!!! I should've really got myself motivated to get posting with all that spare time, but they've just flown by, and now we're into the main Summer hols. I have no doubt the back to school madness will seem to commence within minutes of me typing this...

Anyway, with all that warm weather, tropical plants have been growing like mad (when given sufficient water!?!), so I've got a few pix to share with you of stuff that's been going on in the garden since my last blog...so here goes!!!

I'll start with the Dahlias, which I'm am, put simply, becoming addicted to. There are still loads to come out, but I'll probably have to wait a bit to see them because we're not going to be around for two weeks soon, and most of them look set to bloom while we're away. Typical! But hey...there's some grown from seed, some from new tubers this year, and some from last years tubers...

Here's some of the Dahlia's I've grown from seed this year, I think they were from a mix called 'Dandy';

A couple from tubers, one from last year, the other from this year...not sure of name though, sorry...if anyone really wants to know leave me a comment and I'll have a mooch around to see if I can find the packet;

Here's one we bought from a local GC the other week, same applies to the name as the last ^^^;

And finally, here's one we bought from a local nursery. There was no name in this one so I've no idea what it is, but it's a very 'photogenic' flower (if there's such a thing!), so I could only wittle it down to my favourite three (so far this year!);

Here's a picture of the Dicksonia Antarctica, bought last year, with it's fronds fully unfurled. I'm really pleased with this, it had 9 fronds in this Spring's flush, each at least 5ft long. Keeping it well watered with a mister this year (hence the hose thingy around the trunk) so hoping for even more next year. Have also noticed there's a few extra fronds being up thrown up in the last week, although they don't look as big or vigorous as the original ones...and there's also a pic of the Arisaema Consanguineum that has been in the ground for a year now. The leaf on it is pretty spectacular as well (well, was, they're so flimsy they get easily battered by wind and rain...);

We usually only bother getting some orange lilies to fill in gaps and to add some bright colour when there's not much going on;

But this year I bought a variety of bulbs from garden centres to try out...and I'm very pleased so far!!! Like the Dahlia, most look to flowe while we're away which I'm a bit dissapointed about because the two I've had so far have been lovely!!! Here's one of the asiatic ones;

And here's one called 'African Queen'...she's absolutely gorgeous, and has a scent to rival my Brugmansia (which, as many people will know, I can't stop talking about!)...so I had to cut one stem off and bring them inside!!! Hope they come back next year, and I'll deffo be getting more of this type as well for next Summer;

A quick snap of a couple of mystery snapdragon's that we've no idea where they came from;

A fern I bought....ummmm.....Dryopteris Erythrosora I think......it had loads of lovely pink new fronds when I bought it, and they've now gone a loevly lime green, but it's just sent out a few more fronds which are also starting off that lovely pink colour;

A purchase of which I am very proud, Cyperus Papyrus (more on that in a few weeks :D), along with some Crocosmia 'Lucifer';

Bee on a Buddleja that took my fancy;

An Aloe Aristata in flower, this has absolutely masses of offsets and is bursting out of it's pot. Deffo needs separating in a few weeks. Echeveria Glauca (I think) and Aeonium Decorum 'Variegatum' in the background;

And finally, a pic of my Brugmansia 'Grand Marnier' along with that giant Colocasia bulbs I bought a few months back (remember that?) which is doing REALLY well, I'll try and do some proper update pix on that shortly...and then a pic of the Bruggie on it's own, because she deserves it for her fabulous performance so far this year!!!

Hope you enjoyed!!! Check back in for more in the next few days!

Hill House Nursery Purchase Updates

You may remember some time ago I posted about some plants I'd purchased via mail order, from a company in Devon (Hill House Nurseries).Well these plants have been growing so well for me that I thought it was about time I did a quick update :D

The Begonia is really taking off now, especially now that we're getting some warmer, sunnier weather (which makes a change). Upon arrival it already had several nice leaves, which are now starting to die off, but the new ones are starting to be produced pretty fast to replace them! It also had a baby shoot at the base waiting to come up, which is now putting out a couple of leaves, AND I discovered another one emerging the other day, so am hoping for a nice lush plant this Summer. Here's a pic of the overall plant;
And the new leaf as well, can't wait for more of these to appear over Summer! Will looks so nice in amongst the other jungle plants.

That pic was taken a couple of weeks ago still, and it's been coming along nicely since then. Well worth the money paid for it!

The other plant I bought, a Brugmansia 'Grand Marnier' is coming along even better! The white/yellow leaves have almost all gone now and been replaced by healthy, bigger green ones. I think they might have just been down to getting kick started into growth, as all my other Brugmansias that are just starting into growth have also got white/slightly deformed leaves, but the subsequent leaves revert back to normal. BUT, most important of all, we have forking!!!
Before a Brugmansia starts to flower, it needs to have 'forked' naturally at some point, although a cutting taken above a 'fork' can flower without forking. Basically, any part of a plant taken from above a fork can flower. Anywho, I found a teensy fork on the 'Grand Marnier' the other week, which is when I took this picture - the two leaves at the same stage indicate that two shoots are forming, plus I could see a microscopic bud on the other side. It's been progressing agonisingly slowly, but hopefully in a few weeks time I'll have my first Bruggie flower of the season, and I can't wait for it! Here's a picture of the whole plant, taken a week or two ago (just as I'd watered it, hence why it's a little wilted), looking nice and healthy now that green leaves are regrowing :D Will keep you posted on these great plants!

Sowing & Potting Up

Just thought I'd let you know what I've managed to get done so far in the garden!

Have been busy potting up bulbs recently - I potted up the three Lily 'Marrakech', 8 Lilium Oriental Mixed Colour and 6 Nerine Bowdenii which are all now potted up in the greenhouse just to get them going. Hopefully once the garden gets organised I can then plant them out for flowering; I do the same thing every year but they never get planted as the garden never gets organised, but really hoping they make it into the ground this year! Also emptied out a couple of pots of Zantedeschia 'Elliotiana' that I bought last year and cleaned up and repotted the tubers in those. The Sprekelia Formosissima also got potted up; I'm not sure whether it'll flower this year or not as it's quite a small bulb, but hopefully with some TLC it'll oblige next year. That's all I can remember for now!

I also emptied out, cleaned up and repotted several of the Hedychium I bought last year that were simply bursting out of their pots! The only problem is, the rhizomes of these grow horizontally, with the growth point carrying on growing horizontally one end, so by the end of this season the ones that need over Wintering will have filled their pots once again. I guess I'll just have to find the will power to chop the end of the rhizome off that nothing's growing from, but they all seem healthy at the moment, even if nothing's growing from them. Anywho, my Hedychium Densiflorum is showing signs of growing already which I'm pleased about, and several others are still green in the greenhouse and are still growing, so I'll be interested to see if these stems continue to grow this year, and there's a good chance they'll flower quite early if they do, which should be quite exciting.

Also, with regard to the Brugmansia seeds and other bits and bobs I sowed the other week - quite a few of the Brugmansia have come up, and they've now been potted on and are coming on nicely in the greenhouse. The remaining seeds are still on the propagator, and hopefully they'll come up over the next few weeks. Also, I've had a seedling emerge in a bag of 5 Ensete 'Kluay Pa' seeds, which I'm quite excited about. These seeds are usually quite difficult to germinate, so getting one out of just five seeds would be quite an acheivement! However, as it's been emerging, it does look similar to a Canna seedling (which I guess one can expect, being related to them), but as it's now progressing I'm almost certain it's a Kluay Pa, so am looking forward to seeing this baby grow over the Summer, and she'll be getting lots of TLC!

Quite a lot of sowing and growing going on now, and more seeds to be sorted soon so will keep you all up to date!

Bulb Shopping Downtown!

The past few weekends have seen me once again visiting the local garden centre's, and while I've bought quite a few bulbs from there, there are also some good places to buy cheap bulbs in town! During the past couple of weeks, trips to town have seen me arriving home with bulbs from Wilkinsons and Poundland, all for great prices in my opinion. Last year I also bought some nice bulbs from Woolworths, but they are now no more. Bulbs I've bought from Wilkinsons include;

20 Dutch Iris - I grew these a couple of years ago. I planted them around this time of year, and then were all up and budding up just before we went on our 2 week holiday to Florida. Upon arriving home, there were 50+ gorgeous Dutch Iris in flower, and they were truly amazing!!! I think I bought them from poundland that year, and might buy some more from there this year as well, but here's a couple of pics of them from that year. Sorry they're not great, they were taken with the old camera;





I've also come home with 6 Lilium Oriental Mixed Colours (am on a lily addiction this year!), 10 Sparaxis Harlequin Flower Mixed (haven't tried these before, they look quite pretty), 10 Babiana Stricta Mixed Colours (again, haven't tried these before, but look pretty as well), 20 Tigridia Mixed (tried these last year without much success, but they were kept rolling around in pots all season so what should I expect!!!), 15 Anenome De Caen Mixed (have grow these before, they very pretty and easy to grow) and 30 Freesia Double Mixed, which I bought as they look quite pretty, plus they're supposed to be fragrant, so should provide some nice scent around the patio.

And there's more!!! Now we move onto the poundland buys - a 100 bulb collection, consisting of 25 Anenome De Caen, 50 Liatris Spicata and 25 Oxalis Iron Cross, which should all give some interesting plants, and should at least flower next, if not this year, 4 Incarvillea (Hardy Gloxinia), I grew these the year before last and they were absolutely gorgeous, but couldn't find bulbs anywhere last year and seed was expensive! Am glad they're back this year, hoping they'll grow as well again, 8 Scented Lilies Oriental Mixture, again bought for the colour, lily addiction and scent! And finally, a pack of 4 Lily 'Black Out' and 4 Commelina, both of which look pretty and make a nice combo.

Phew!!! So all in all that's around 231 bulbs for £16, not bad at all in my opinion! Will keep you all updated as to how they grow.

Here are some pics of Lilies I've grown in previous years. If anyone knows of any varieties similar to those in my last three picture, or where I can buy some, please let me know as they were gorgeous lilies with the markings, but despite there being a good range in GC's this year, I can't find any that look like those.








Enjoy!