Tag Archives: flowers

Six on Saturday – Orchid Palooza

Rather than touring my garden this Saturday morning, I have been installing and watering orchids in trees. A friend, who is a longtime orchid enthusiast brought me a selection of plants when we met for Thai food and plant shopping earlier this week. To join the SOS gang or see what’s going on in gardens around the world, follow the link to Jim’s Blog.

The selection:

This bucket contains Dancing Lady orchids. These are an Oncidium orchid, native to Southeast Asia, a tropical and a water lover. They can produce sprays of flowers 10 feet long. These are yellow.

This bucket contains Dendrobiums and a no name orchid that looks dead and then flowers! The no name has buds.

My tree of choice to install the orchids. This is a Sabal Palm (Palmetto sabal) that has never had the bases of its old fronds cleared off. I like the look of these palms and haven’t had them cleaned. This is called a booted Palm. The boots provide planting pockets and many people install orchids or bromeliads in them. The Asian Sword Ferns have grown up the tree by themselves – I decided to clear some off before installing the orchids.

The Dancing Ladies installed. I placed coconut coir, soaked in water, in the boots, then wedged the orchids in and secured them with jute twine. After reading how big these grow I decided to install the other orchids in different trees.

The no name ‘dead’ orchid was placed in the Gumbo Limbo tree alongside a Schlomburgkia orchid that has been in the tree for a few years. Below is the Schlomburgkia sending up buds. Maybe I should call the no name orchid ‘Zombie’

The Schlomburgkia, buds on the right side. These are native to the Yucatan peninsula in Mexico and live in Mangrove swamps along the Gulf of Mexico. The flower sprays are easily six feet long with multiple pink and red orchids.

Finally, the Dendrobiums ended up in the Catalina Avocado tree and they seemed very happy.

I have no idea how long it takes for the orchids to establish and flower, but it will be interesting to watch.

Thanks to Jim for hosting Six on Saturday and Happy Spring Gardening to all!!

In a Vase on Monday – Gingerly into the Garden

I have been eyeing the Shell Ginger (Alpinia zerumbet) for at least a week, watching the buds get bigger and bigger and stubbornly not flowering. Finally, the temperature soared to 90F/32C on Saturday and evidently inspired the Shell Ginger to open up. The miniature heat wave also caused the gigantic Strangler Fig to drop its leaves, so I walked gingerly through the leaves (fall is really not a thing here and I have yet to figure out the circle of life on the leaf drop on this tree) and started to cut flowers. Then, the bottom dropped out and I was in a torrential rainfall. Likely a result of the cold front behind the heat wave. Gingers in hand, I proceeded gingerly back into the house, drenched and enjoying the fragrant bouquet.

These are such dramatic flowers, I think they are at their best simply arranged. These are in one of my old florist vases and as is with their own foliage. I trimmed a good deal of the foliage off to allow the flowers to shine. The flowers are lightly fragrant adding a subtle ginger scent to the foyer.

A close up-

The flowers always remind me of porcelain and they are quite thick. I think the trip into the garden was worthwhile. The rain cleared, the temperature dropped and it is a beautiful, blue sky day.

To see more vases, visit our hostess, Cathy at ramblinginthegarden and follow the links in the comments.

In a Vase on Monday – Tropical Spring Roll

My spring roll is filled with different ingredients than one found in a Thai restaurant. A bromeliad leaf is wrapped around delicious contents from the garden. The names of some of the contents could be considered food – asparagus (fern), sage (salvia) – but I think we would be hard pressed to chew through the roll. It could possibly be considered high fiber/low carb for oh, say rodents or a passing iguana. My plan is to admire the flowers.

The ingredients:

My salvias are having a great year. Here they are again, Mystic Blue and White Flame. The pink flower is known as the tulip of the Treasure Coast. They don’t really remind me of tulips, but I get it. They are actually bromeliads, Billbergia pyramidalis. Green foliage is Asparagus fern and the wrapping leaf is from Blanchetiana Bromeliad (Aechmea blanchetiana). I love the green/mahogany coloration of the Blanchetiana leaves in winter, they are chartreuse in summer.

The weather here has finally turned in favor of gardening. My tomatoes are ripening and spring is in the air. On the down side, the moles ate all the bulbs and tubers, making me realize I should stop wasting money on these lovelies. I also accidentally grew some rabbit tobacco I thought was Chinese Forget Me Nots, oh well. Rabbit tobacco is a weed and a rite of passage in my youth. Boys would smoke it pretending like it was cigarettes! I am told it was harsh, but I never tried it.

Thanks to Cathy for hosting this weekly meme. Follow this link to see more vases.

Six on Saturday – Spring Promise

My Saturday morning garden stroll revealed that spring comes early in South Florida. The scents and sights are promising tropical fruits and flowers later this year. To participate in the blog phenomena Six on Saturday and tour gardens around the world, visit Jim’s blog and follow the links in the comments.

A new arrival in the mail greeted me yesterday – a nice rooted cutting of ‘Gardenmeister’ Fuchsia. This will have to be a sort of a reverse house plant. Outside in winter and indoors for summer. Summer heat and humidity will kill this outside. Should be an interesting experiment.

Buds on the Graptosedum.

Buds on the Shell Ginger (Alpinia zerumbet). I am hoping for flowers next week. This is the only ginger I have any luck with. It is over five feet tall.

The back garden smells wonderful. The scent is from the Rangpur lime tree flowering more prolifically than it ever has.

Thai dessert mangos (Nam Doc Mai) setting lots of fruit.

That’s all from South Florida. I hope everyone is seeing signs of spring.

Six on Saturday – The Year of the Dragon

Welcome to The Year of the Dragon. Chinese New Year is today and what will the Dragon bring to my garden? Above, in celebration of this event I have shared a piece of art created by two local ladies who are responsible for the creation of https://www.facebook.com/tctrashart, A Facebook page dedicated to raising awareness and getting rid of garbage on the beach by creating and sharing art they make from their finds.

I went looking in my garden this morning to find six new possibilities for the Dragon. Fruits and flowers are budding and sprouting, it’s looking promising for the New Year! To tour other garden possibilities, visit the host of this weekly meme, Jim, at his blog.

The Rangpur lime is flowering and has set fruit for next winter. I managed to collect enough fruit and made a pie with the juice and zest this week. We ate it!

Rangpur limes are considered sour oranges as it is a mandarin/lemon cross. So – in Old Florida this would be considered a sour orange pie.

The Mexican papayas I planted from seed last year are now five feet tall and setting buds. Upper right side of photo. Papayas are not true to seed and are either male, female or hermaphrodite. I planted two trees, the other one is looking male, so I hope this one will be female or hermaphrodite.

Zinnias or sunflowers sprouting. I haven’t planted anything in this bed for a couple of years, it was infested with nematodes and has been “lying fallow” to get rid of the buggers. Fingers crossed.

Ice plants, they used to be called Delosperma cooperii in latin. I think the botanists have changed the name again. There are two schools of thought about these growing in South Florida – yes and no. I found some very low priced plants and am trying them. They are looking good so far, August will be the true test.

Alligator Lilies (Hymenocallis latifolia) waiting to find a new home. They are a very pretty native lily, but they are difficult to site in the garden. They are looking for moist, well drained dappled sun and they only make foliage if not in their preferred location. I move them around sometimes, contemplating their next location.

‘Burgundy’ Aechmea bromeliad showing new spring color. These have finally found their happy place. And I don’t want to move them as they are sharp.

That is all from my garden this Saturday. Happy New Year!

In a Vase on Monday – Plunder and Plonk

Mid-winter in Florida brings its share of garden surprises. I never know what I might find and decided to clip a little bit of treasure here and there and plonk my plunder into an old florist vase that was hanging around. My husband informed me this is similar to the way I cook, which is true. I look in the fridge and freezer and make a dish from whatever I find. It usually works out. I have never thought of creating food as a plunder and plonk before!

My garden treasures this Monday:

The top of the vase is sporting, in orange with green tips, Soap Aloe (Aloe saponaria). These do too well in my garden and I need to thin them. The reddish flowers next to them are China Hat (Holmskioldia sanguinea). Small blue flowers are Variegated Flax Lilies (Dianella tasmanica), an unbelievably hardy plant – I just unearthed it from overgrown vines and it was so happy it flowered luxuriously. Boston Fern (Nephrolepis exaltata) is in the background.

The salvias continue to thrive, in blue, Mystic Spires and the white is White Flame. Yellow daisies are from Beach Sunflowers (Helianthus debilis), the white ones are Bidens alba, both are natives.

Visit the blog of our weekly meme hostess Cathy to see more garden treasures in vases.

Happy Gardening!!

Six on Saturday – Sun!

It’s a great Saturday morning in South Florida. The drearies have been conquered for the moment and the sun is shining. The flowers perked up and I am finding new blooms in the garden to share this Saturday. Visit Jim’s blog to join Six on Saturday tours of gardens around the world.

Here’s a mad flower from Bromeliadland. This is a Quesnelia testudo. I am not sure of the common name. These do well in my garden and are reliable winter color.

Another mad bromeliad in flower. This is a native Tillandsia, a relative of Spanish Moss, the flowers are brown. This is called Ball Moss (Tillandsia recurvata). It is growing on the trunk of a Bougainvillea.

I finally snagged a Rangpur lime before the vampire rats sucked the juice out. I need a few more for pie.

The mango trees are setting buds. This does not bode well, I think. They usually flower in March and we get fruit in June.

Heliconia psittacorum “Lady Di” expressed her appreciation for all the rain.

Google identified this as Golden Stonecrop (Sedum adolphi Firestorm). This has been in a pot for a few years and has not flowered before.

A question ?? Does anyone know if this is a Dahlia? I planted some tubers of a Dwarf Dahlia in October in this spot and this is coming up. I have found that Dahlias have a mind of their own when deciding to grow.

Thanks for the input and thanks to Jim for hosting.

That’s all from my garden this Saturday. Happy Gardening!!

Six on Saturday – Winter Interest & Green Bees

Well, it is time for another garden tour. We are having the rainiest El Nino winter I have ever experienced in Florida. I was in the garden for an hour or so this morning and now it is pouring down rain yet again. We are molding slowly. To join the worldwide tour visit Jim at gardenruminations.co.uk and follow the links posted in the comments section to other gardens.

The green bee! This is a green orchid bee, they arrived in Florida about 20 years ago from Central America. I don’t think these are especially bad in terms of non native insects and enjoy seeing them around the garden. This one is enjoying a sip of Mystic Spires Salvia nectar. This was a lucky shot. These bees are difficult to photograph.

This is a nice surprise. I think it is Senecio vitalis. I did not think this succulent would grow out in the garden due to too much moisture from rain. They have been in a pot on a covered porch for a few years and have gotten too big. I rooted a few cuttings over the summer and planted them in the garden a few months ago. They are thriving and getting a lot of moisture, I suppose the sugar sand is so well drained they like it. Time will tell.

A white oxalis in flower. A friend’s grandmother filched this from a garden in Ireland in the 1950s. It must grow everywhere.

Lotusleaf Begonias (Begonia nelumbiifolia) are enjoying the abundant moisture. I am not sure what is eating the leaves. I have never seen a slug here but we do have snails.

Ti Plant (Cordyline fruticosa) It has taken a few years for this plant to develop the hot pink coloration. It was solid green for a long time. I thought I had a cheesy cultivar. Maybe not. Patience rewards the gardener.

Foliage detail on a Pie Crust Croton (Codieum variegatum) leaf. One of my favorites and a real splash of color in the garden.

That’s all from my garden this Saturday. Wishing everyone Happy Gardening or Happy Seed Catalog Reading. It is a good afternoon for that here.

In a Vase on Monday – Catching the Christmas Bus

Last week we caught up on our holiday tasks. Cards were mailed – Happy Holidays cards in case they did not make it in time for Christmas. Holiday baking is almost complete, treats for Fiona the greyhound, Christmas nuts and cheese cookies for snacks have been baked and my husband smoked two kinds of pork. A wreath was made and hung on the front door, a Christmas tree found and decorated – the one remaining holiday tradition has now been attended to…the bus.

This is the seventh appearance of the IAVOM holiday shortbread bus. A client of my husband’s brought a tin of shortbread from the UK, we ate every cookie and then it was filled with flowers for the holidays. Again and again.

This years bus details:

Varigated foliage is from ‘Java White’ Copperleaf (Acalypha wilkesiana); grey “rose” is Graptosedum succulent; red berries are from the evil invasive, Brazilian Pepper (Schinus terebinthifilia); small bell shaped flowers are Firecracker Plant (Russelia equisetum); red flowers are Nodding Hibiscus (Malvaviscus arboreum).

White spikes are Tropical Red Salvia (Salvia coccinea); white banded foliage is from ‘Bossa Nova’ Bromeliad (Neoregelia ‘Bossa Nova’)

Whew! I am ready to relax, have a snack and enjoy some peace on earth and good will towards men. I hope the world finds both.

Happy Holidays to all and thank you to Cathy at http://ramblinginthegarden.wordpress.com for hosting this weekly meme. Follow the link to see more vases.