November 2009 in the Southern Hemisphere

[maggiepie]

Bill, can Watsonia be somewhat invasive?
The reason I am wondering is that I have seen it growing wild in areas in Oz, am not sure if there had homes at some of these places that had disappeared over time.

[Paddy Tobin]

Helen,

It would be hard to complain about that white watsonia, even it was running a bit wild. I grow several species and cultivars here and have always found the white ones to be the slowest to bulk up.

Here some cultivars bulk up into good sized clumps with reasonable ease but do not seed about.

Bill's is an especially good plant.

Paddy

[Lvandelft]

Ray,

have you some information about Urcelonia peruvianna? Look's like a bulb.

Uli, have a look on this site. It is in more languages and German too.
http://de.gardening.eu/Pflanzen/Zwiebeln/Urceolina-peruviana/2520/

Urceolina peruviana is beautiful!

[maggiepie]

Paddy,

I wouldn't complain if there was a big clump of Bill's white watsonia out in my garden either.
I doubt the ones I remember from my childhood were anywhere near as nice.
Actually, I never knew what they were, we used to call them wild gladioli.

[ajbroome]

Bill, re: Drac. vulgaris.

> ...rather vaginal spathe, leading this aroid to be called "amorphallus"

I'm not sure that anatomically 'vaginal' and '...phallus' are equivalent.

(hopefully that's not offensive to anyone here).

Andrew.

[ajbroome]

Arum dioscoridis.

This is the form that I consider to be 'typical' in cultivation in NZ.

Andrew.

[ajbroome]

Folks,

Iris nelsonii, a personal favourite.  Given to me by a friend but apparently originally from southeast of Abbeville, Louisiana.

Andrew.

[ajbroome]

Folks,

Ornithogalum dubium.

I have *no* idea how to grow this.  I bought it flowering about 6 years ago as one plant.  The next year it came up but didn't flower.  The intervening years it never even came up but I couldn't throw it out as there was a healthy bulb in the pot.  This year, 9 plants came up and they're all flowering.  Weird.

Andrew.

[ajbroome]

Folks,

Romulea rosea.  I know it's a weed but if it did the decent thing and was difficult to grow and didn't reproduce so easily then everybody would want it.

Andrew.

[ajbroome]

Folks,

A 2nd attempt at this one, sorry if it turns up twice.

Arisaema ciliatum.  I don't know if this is the ssp liubaense or not.  It's always hard to get a decent photo as the flower is typically hidden between two leaves...

Andrew.

[ajbroome]

Folks,

Disa tripetaloides 'white - Sielmar'.

For some reason after sitting around for years both my Disas are flowering this year, D. uniflora isn't far away...

Andrew.

[ajbroome]

Folks,

Stylidium graminifolium, the only species of one of favourite genera that we're allowed in NZ.  I have to go to Australia to see other species...

I'll post photos of the flowers once they open but I'm rather excited to see this flower after almost losing it.

Andrew.

[ajbroome]

Folks,

Phaedranessa cinerea, it never opens up to be the umbel I'm expecting from the photos I've seen (the bracts seem to get in the way).  Still, a nice thing that sets seed...

Andrew.

[Maggi Young]

Folks, do you remember some discussion of Autumn flowering Camellias in the October Flowering Now thread?  

Re: Flowering in October 2009
« Reply #143 on: October 25, 2009, 12:37:17 PM

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Thanks so much Paul for giving an overview of Camellias through the months - very good news and I shall do some searching to see what I can grow  

Look at this in Jim McKenney's Blog.......   http://mcwort.blogspot.com/       lovely big plants, full of flower!

[Lesley Cox]

I looked at May, being equivilent to our November. Poor, beautiful little bird.