Scottish Rock Garden Club Forum
General Subjects => Flowers and Foliage Now => Topic started by: fermi de Sousa on March 04, 2013, 06:44:27 AM
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I guess everyone is too busy to start this thread for th SH so I shall!
Here are some flowers that obviously obey the government's ruling that Autumn starts on March 1st - despite the fact that it'll be 30oC
Habranthus tubispathus
Habranthus martinezii
cheers
fermi
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Fermi you beat me to it to show a great clump of Habranthus andersonii or whatever it is now. I was crunching up the hill yesterday when I noticed this bright patch so I grabbed my camera to take a photo and then noticed further across the hill there is an expanse of them now where they have seeded over the years. I used to have a bit of a garden there but the only things left are good clumps of Urginias and Iris unguicularis which seem to love the dryness and lack of care.
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No problem with you showing your pics as well, Pat!
The dark flowered Amaryliis belladonna (?hybrid) is now in bloom.
cheers
fermi
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The golden expanse of Habranthus tubispathus naturalizing.
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Nice to see those Habranthus naturalising, Pat!
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I just hope I don't rue the day they started naturalizing Cohen
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That did occur to me, I know that is a special concern in your part of the world.. if it happens, you can start an export business ;)
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That's how I earn my money Cohan . Exporting seeds of introduced weeds to NZ
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I just hope I don't rue the day they started naturalizing Cohen
Pat, I would rather have those Habranthus than the Meconopsis cambrica that I have spreading unruly in my garden ;)
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Hoy I should imagine that no self respecting Meconopsis would even grow here. At least the Habranthus will give the weedy Romulea a run for its money. We all have our own weedy plants.
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That's how I earn my money Cohan . Exporting seeds of introduced weeds to NZ
Maybe you will be able to add Habranthus to your catalogue ;D Or has it been kept out of NZ?
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Might have to go to Australia for some R and D
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Pat , my Rhodophiala bifida is in flower -are the ones I sent you too? I don't think they will selfsow as vigorously as Habranthus tubispathus ,but a few square meters of it in flower would be a wonderful sight .
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Rhodophiala bifida
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Hi Otto - no flowers yet.
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Otto- a few square inches of that would be pretty striking!
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Hoy I should imagine that no self respecting Meconopsis would even grow here. At least the Habranthus will give the weedy Romulea a run for its money. We all have our own weedy plants.
Well, sometimes I think other peoples weeds are prettier than mine ;)
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Otto,
My Rhodophiala bifida from Ferny Creek looks like it's just starting to send up a flower bud. Hopefully it will bloom well now that the continuous days of 30°C+ heat have come to an end (thank goodness). :)
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No Rhodophialas out here either!
More autumn blooms:
Lycoris elsae
A white Amaryllis belladonna hybrid
cheers
fermi
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I thought when the first flower came out on a belladonna in the garden that it was pure white but then the pink came to the edges as the flower aged. It is growing in a lot of shade.
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Hi,
Rhodophiala bifida are blooming on the Adelaide plains.. in fact they were blooming in February, the attached photo was taken on February 21. Odd little story to go with these bulbs.. I bought three bulbs from Drewitts bulbs back in 09, I've had one flower scape a year and just leaves from the other two bulbs. This year all three bulbs flowered and produced two scapes each. Now I'm wondering whether I had different bulbs flower each year but assumed because of their proximity that the same bulb flowered while the others sulked. Anyway this year was great. A random feather blew onto the lawn while the bulbs were flowering so I transferred the pollen.. and now there is seed setting for the first time!
And this is cheating a little... because I didn't get a chance to post in February here are a couple of others that bloomed then Amarine and Lycoris (supposed to be aurea but I'm not sure - they certainly are the brightest of yellows) and a few blooming now Sternbergia lutea and two colchicium species (again these are common in old Adelaide gardens but I'm not certain of the species. I think Colchium 1 is byzantium and 2 is agrippinum).
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Continuing post .. to add Colchicium pics
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Hi,
Apologies for breaking the flow of flowers. Couldn't resist showing the snake I trod on in January. Finally caught him lurking by the sternbergias. Just knelt down to pollinate the little blighters and out of the corner of my eye I caught sight of Mr Tiger slipping away along the line of the boxes. Thank God it was going away! It caught itself in some bird netting and put on a very muscular show until I called Reptile Rescue. They had to snip him out of the netting with some scissors I lent them. He turned out to be she - apparently a pregnant she!
Cheers, Marcus
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She is certainly a fine specimen! Glad you didn't get bitten. A friend uses bird netting to catch snakes but she also despatches them with a shotgun.
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I would have thought snakes would be useful in keeping rodent numbers down. Having seen YouTube of mouse plagues in Oz. Killing rattlers in the US is producing populations of silent snakes, as the rattle gives them away and brings instant death.:(
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Hi Anthony,
Yes they probably are. I wasn't trying to get rid of it and would have left it alone except it had caught itself in the netting ... And I wasn't interested in giving it a hand to extricate itself. The snake was relocated by the guy who caught it. I think there is a lot of fear and loathing about these animals and in the bad old days people destroyed them at every opportunity. I can understand this if a snake takes up residence close to one's home and there are small children or pets about. Tassie has only 3 species and all of them are quite shy and fairly unaggressive. I may have a different view of them if I lived where Pat or Fermi are. I believe the King Brown is very aggressive and a dangerous proposition.
Cheers, Marcus
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Hi Anita,
What are you growing the colchicums through? I ask this because Michael McCoy has a piece on his blog asking gardeners how they dealt with the problem of companion planting with these plants. Here is the link: http://thegardenist.com.au/2013/03/rsvplant/ (http://thegardenist.com.au/2013/03/rsvplant/)
Cheers, Marcus
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Hi Anthony,
Yes they probably are. I wasn't trying to get rid of it and would have left it alone except it had caught itself in the netting ... And I wasn't interested in giving it a hand to extricate itself. The snake was relocated by the guy who caught it. I think there is a lot of fear and loathing about these animals and in the bad old days people destroyed them at every opportunity. I can understand this if a snake takes up residence close to one's home and there are small children or pets about. Tassie has only 3 species and all of them are quite shy and fairly unaggressive. I may have a different view of them if I lived where Pat or Fermi are. I believe the King Brown is very aggressive and a dangerous proposition.
Cheers, Marcus
I realise that Marcus and was impressed you went to the trouble. My view is if you have a problem with local snakes you either live with it or move. Certain parts of the world are now over run with rats because snakes have been eradicated.
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Yes I say live with it ... now that the brown snake seems to have moved on out of the garden. But snakes are fascinating to watch from a safe distance. Like traveling around the pots in the pond looking for frogs or digging into clumps of kangaroo grass to find a toad to eat.
Seeing archival footage recently of mouse plagues certainly opened my eyes to how bad they can get. Also rabbit plague footage was amazing.
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What a difference a day or two makes. Oxtongue lilies emerging and being being stepped on by chooks or kangaroos.
Otto your bulb has flowered for me - lovely.
The Belladonna which ages to soft pink from a crystal clear white
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Hi Anita,
What are you growing the colchicums through? I ask this because Michael McCoy has a piece on his blog asking gardeners how they dealt with the problem of companion planting with these plants. Here is the link: http://thegardenist.com.au/2013/03/rsvplant/ (http://thegardenist.com.au/2013/03/rsvplant/)
Cheers, Marcus
Marcus,
I guess the answer is lots of stuff. I basically avoid having bare ground so have lots of groundcovers to suppress weeds. Areas which are shaded during summer are covered by various Ajugas. Areas in full sun are covered by violets. Surprisingly viloets are pretty tough. They will collapse in heatwaves but revive with a cool evening and a drink (bit like me).
I'll have to checkout the blog as I'm fond of Michael's writing.
Cheers Anita
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I had to Google oxtongue lily. ;D I was distracted by the quantity. :o I'm still awaiting my first flower on the plant in a pot on its lonesome. :-\
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Anthony I could not recall the botanical name at the time of posting the Oxtongue lilies - Haemanthus coccineus
Photo taken this morning of their progress - we just shooed a few kangaroos out of this front garden just now - they went under the fence - they certainly damage the fences and I have noticed roses that as well as being trimmed have broken branches, apple trees being stripped of bark. Come on rain!!
Urginia maritima spent flower stalk - 1ft more than my 5ft height.
Both these plants have been in our garden for about 30 years.
Barkland at present as the red gums shed their bark - and sometimes ... limbs.
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Pat, should you ever have seed on the Urginea maritima I would be interested in a few. I suspect they take a while to get to flowering size, but I haven't located anyone selling bulbs here in NZ.
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Anthony if I had known you were after Urginia seed I could have plucked you bags of it when I was in Greece last year. I never collect it probably for the same irrational reasons that I eschew asphodels and their kin.
I have the same bark and kangaroo problems as you Pat. Happily the plants in the nursery are fenced off from the roos' hungry maws but the garden is exposed and I have a cranky old pademelon chewing away at my lilies (I must say he is most particular - he only nibbles the leaves).
I leave the gums to it for a month and then clean it all up once they have completed their deschabillage.
It is a bit niggling for a tidy freak like myself but I have trained myself to restraint!
Cheers, Marcus
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When my ship comes in I'll be at the airport Marcus. ;D
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I had a flower stem this year on an Urginea grown from seed but unfortunately I did not write the date on the label as to when I sowed them. I will find a few seeds for you. I left the Habranthus tubispathus a day or two too long to collect seed - the winds the other day certainly didn't help.
Anthony there are a few green seed pods on that Urginea stem. Seeing the Eremurus in NZ was mindblowing but I just seem to not be able to grow them from seed.
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Rhodophiala bifida has finally started in our garden!
The first is a single bulb from some we received from Paul T, the second is a clump built up from a few we bought from someone commercial - possibly Hancocks - more than 10 years ago.
They all seem a bit paler than the ones Jon and Otto and Anita grow.
cheers
fermi
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Some more bulbs in flower:
Sternbergia lutea
Sternbergia sicula
Acis autumnalis
Narcissus obsoletus
White Cyclamen graecum
cheers
fermi
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Lovely to see all these treasures growing so well with you Fermi.
Cheers, Marcus
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Well, we had a shower of rain today, but my rain lily (Zephyranthes candida) anticipated it by a few days. This clump gets very little sun.
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Anthony this time of year I have noticed that rainlilies can herald rain I am sure.
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Well blow me. Tonight it is chucking it down. The rain lilies were right. ;D