Early spring in the Southern Hemisphere

[fermi de Sousa]

I left out this pic of an imported (not by me!) Dianthus, D."Whatfield Wisp"



cheers
fermi

[Lesley Cox]

You should be OK to bring Fermi, so long as it's on the Bio Index and so long as you declare it. (On the card you fill in on the plane). THAT IS VITAL!!! Will also help if it's very tightly packaged, as in fresh foil, then a well-sealed paper envelope (new). I assume you'll be coming into Chch? Depends how busy MAF are how long it takes. You might have to wait. They know their job all right, and have a computer in front of them anyway. Get the spelling right too.

[Lesley Cox]

I like the double Ipheion Andrew, unusually, as I'm not a big fan of doubles within a species. It's very attractive. Pleased to see Ar. ovale as mine was wrong.

[Lesley Cox]

I had a spam email today from someone in Russia called Ekaterina, aged 22, extremely sexy - if you like overblown body parts - and offering to marry me! I deleted it, then thought maybe I should have forwarded it to - well, who? Mark? Fermi? Derek? Perhaps not, but if anyone's interested, please tell. I'm sure I could ressurect it.

[Maggi Young]

I had a spam email today from someone in Russia called Ekaterina, aged 22, extremely sexy - if you like overblown body parts - and offering to marry me! I deleted it, then thought maybe I should have forwarded it to - well, who? Mark? Fermi? Derek? Perhaps not, but if anyone's interested, please tell. I'm sure I could ressurect it.   

LESLEY! This is NOT that kind of Forum! Behave yourself!

[Lesley Cox]

Well, it seems such a waste, and she was truly gorgeous

[Lesley Cox]

Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. Re the cow. I FORGOT TO TAKE MY CAMERA!   
She was, however, very successful as a crowd puller, with many laughs ringing around. (We had an almost capacity crowd yesterday, about 5000 people through the morning). The front end carried a bag of apples for distribution to children but it surprised me how difficult this proved to be, the local kids apparently well versed in the concept of not accepting goodies from stangers even when the stranger is a cow (well, very strange actually) and even when accompanied by parents. We had to give them to the parents for passing along.

[fermi de Sousa]

Although we saw Lily-flowered tulips in Prague which were the size of standard tulips, in our Rock garden they are perfectly in keeping with the other plants and are a bit dwarf, perhaps due to the lean conditions! Here's one of my favourites, T. "Queen of Sheba"



In the "native section" a prostrate banksia, B. blechnifolia, has it's first cone!



and a first flowering from AGS Seedex seed 2005 of Cyclamen persicum "ex Israel"!



Though you can't see it in the close-up, there are 2 in flower, one with mottled foliage and a slightly longer more open flower.



cheers
fermi

[Lesley Cox]

Very nice Fermi.

[annew]

Lovely - and that Banksia is so like a Blechnum!

[fermi de Sousa]

Last week I posted a pic of the buds on paeonia cambessedessii,
here's the first flower opening on the weekend.


And here's the patch of Tulipa saxatilis, just at its peak!



cheers
fermi

[Luc Gilgemyn]

Great show Fermi !
What a relief to see your sunny spring pictures in the midst of our today's autumn weather with wind and rain....

[Mini-daffs]

 
Hi
Luc, a bit of rain here in Canberra would be most welcome!
Fermi, your peony is a couple of weeks ahead of ours.

[fermi de Sousa]

A couple of weeks ago I posted a pic of Euphorbia rigida in the Rock garden; we also grow E. myrsinites and below is a pic of what I think may be a cross between the two.


It has growth somewhat sprawling, but not quite upright and the flower heads are much larger than normal for E. myrsinites.

Graham,
our peonies are growing in a raised  bed in the open, so that would account for the difference in flowering time.

The dampieria I posted earlier is also doing a good job of pretending to be a chasmophyte!
cheers
fermi

[Luc Gilgemyn]

Lovely little Dampiera Fermi !
Have you grown it for long - is it hardy ?