Scottish Rock Garden Club Forum
General Subjects => Flowers and Foliage Now => Topic started by: Lesley Cox on December 31, 2013, 10:51:27 PM
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A cool day to start the new year so I'll go out later maybe but for now am enjoying a little bit of a break on the Forum and am pleased to start a new thread for the Southern Hemisphere. Of course there's a One Day Cricket match on in Queenstown which I may listen to on the radio (not televised on Free-to-Air) and I'm also listening to "Settling the Score," a twelve hour (8am-8pm) radio programme of classical music chosen by the station's listeners, (each listing his/her 3 favourite works for the year) and the most chosen 60 are played, sometimes not in full which is a bit frustrating. A real mixture of works from the 12th century until the present time and not necessarily what one might expect so always some surprises. I think the programme is in its 15th year now.
Cool and wet weather through Nov/Dec have meant that I'm living in a temperate jungle at present. The weeds are legion and more happily, what I've so far planted is thriving and growing like...Weeds! Seeds too are continuing to germinate when in other years they stop around October until another burst in the autumn. Primula seeds from Barnhaven were sown the first week of November, started to germinate 3 weeks later and some are already potted up. I bought a total of 31 packets, mainly as future nursery plants and almost all have germinated well, especially the acaulis types but also sieboldii forms and a selection of different auriculas. Only a mix of marginata/allionii forms has yet to germinate.
A few pictures below of things which have been good recently. The little perennial violas are such good value. I have a locally produced black called, not surprisingly, 'All Black' but it's difficult to photograph. It and 'Haslemere' are sterile which is good because with 'Major Primrose' picking dead heads with developing seed is a daily task. Alas, I have lost my precious 'Jackanapes.' The penstemoon is photographed too late for its best, a pure colour but tending purple in its last flowers. It will bloom again if I trim off these stems. I bought the pale yellow hosta while filling in time between salestable shifts at the rose show where our Iris group were invited to have a stall and the white centred one was here when we came. I don't know its name
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The Iris ensata cultivar may well be called 'Emperor.' It's very sumptuous and velvety. I didn't like these huge flat flowers much for many years but they've grown on me and this year I've been able to obtain several. They're liking the damp conditions here. Before I went to the Cz Rep I planted in a great hurry, 7 different forms of Gladiolus nanus, modern cultivars and hoped for a great show. Only one has obliged with 12 stems from the 5 corms. 3 others are up but not flowering and the remaining 3 haven't showed at all, perhaps because of the drowning winter we had. It's quite likely the corms rotted. I'll get more this coming autumn and plant them in big pots because this one, called 'Impressive' is truly a wonderful thing, the colour being a soft creamy salmon shade, prettier than in the picture. Chocolate Cosmos forms are doing really well, the black here being a seedling and already with seed forming as I'm hand pollinating each flower. The redder form is called 'Coco Chanel' and seems to be sterile but I'm trying its pollen on the darker flower in hope of getting seed that will bloom redder. The eryngium is called 'Picos Blue,' grown a few years ago from Marcus Harvey's seed. It is viciously prickly but I love the silver and steely blue combination.
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This super little blue daisy is called Charieis heterophylla and I've had it off and on for many years. It can be sown where it is to flower as it is an annual unfortunately but so easy and the seed is easy to gather and hold until frost is past. It is often confused with Felecia bergeriana whose rays are peacock blue and whose disc is yellow. I am filling in spaces with the Charieis so there will be masses of seed later in the summer if anyone would like it to try. Ajuga 'Arctic Fox is cute and takes on a beetroot colour to replace the white, in very cold or winter conditions, whitening again when the spring comes. There's just a touch of pink there now. I like the ground orchids which are so easy and seeded around in the Saddle Hill garden so that when I moved I had about 100 in small pots. I hoped they do it here too. They make popular plants for sale and all of my transported lot have now gone. I have this one as Dactylorhiza foliosa but I'm not sure that the specific name is correct. They do hybridize somewhat, My favourite is D. maculata with richly spotted leaves. I have to show a rose I suppose. In fact there have been some really good ones and I'll certainly keep what I believe (I'm told by the Rose Soc people) is probably a relatively modern Bourbon rose bred by Kordes in Germany in the early 50s, and called 'Robusta.' It is about 2 metres high at present, heading for the heights by way of a cherry tree and had no sooner finished flowering in late October than there were new buds, still out now. A final picture for the moment, the first stages of my little nursery. There are three beds occupied, all with shade loving plants, the furthest of my own things for planting out ASAP and the nearer two with a few things from the garden but most from the first cuttings I took here of moved plants, and seedlings. The one disadvantage about this position is that while the shade is superb, under the trees (huge plums) there are drips, leaf, flower and fruit fall and roots popping through everywhere. It would be a massive and very expensive job to remove them and of course I'd have to arrange other shade so some protection will be needed, especially from heavy rain and dripping. But everything's growing like crazy and I'll be able to do a list very soon I think. The nearest bed, - the gravel bottom is visible at the front - is also in shade but then there will be 4-6 differently shaped beds in full sun. Roger is building these for me and I'm doing the gravel then filling with plants. The divided driveway has a V-shaped planted out area at the far end, also very shady and it, like everything else must have anti rabbit protection all the time, a nuisance but the little brutes dig and undermine things which fall into the holes, and they eat a large selection as well. As seen in several pictures, there is netting of various kinds, put down in a hurry mostly, to combat a new outrage.
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Just out of picture at the very top of the last one, is the railway line so you can see, it's very close. Sometimes I think the trains are coming in!
Well, that's the morning of New Year's Day totally gone. Time for a tomato sandwich. :) :P
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We tried, and failed, to find a New Year's eve TV programme that would bring in the New Year. Ended up watching the news to see the fireworks from the Sky Tower. There was nothing cheery on the TV. Bring back Scotch and Wry. Last Call - Rev IM Jolly - Hogmanay 1991 - Rikki Fulton (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmrjST8CtVA#)
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I couldn't find anything either Anthony, nor on radio. Roger went to bed about 10pm so I ended up reading until midnight, had a small Glenfiddich then went to bed myself. Slept quite well. :)
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We can see the Sky Tower from the end of our street. First time it's been clear enough to see the fireworks! Lots of fireworks going off around us. Heidi was neither up nor down. We stayed up because James's all night party finished at 1 a.m. as the hostess (his school friend) was working today, so I had to go an pick him up. It was supposed to be an overnighter! As usual, his friend from two streets away asked for a lift. No problem, but it seems to be always my turn. ::) My wife's niece from Bridge of Allan is staying, and she brought a bottle of Deanston single malt from our former neighbours. ;D I've yet to sample it.
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HNY to both of you
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And the same to you David.
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Happy New Year then!! On the subject of new year cheer, we went to the movies yesterday and watched 12 years a slave.. Leslie, the violas and gladiolus are very pretty, speechless for the cosmos atrosanguineus; I ordered a very expensive (due to weight) rootstock this year as I was led to believe by T&M that its seeds occur as often as a unicorn with two tails.. ::)
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As often as a unicorn with two tails? That's possibly even rarer than a unicorn with a twisted horn on its head. ;D T and M should know better as a certain daffodil grower in Yorkshire - a Forumist - let them have seed a couple of years ago, but they applied conditions of non-supply to her. Those don't apply to me however, so if all goes well I'll have some seed later in the summer in which case you may like to try some? I have about 50 young plants in my new little nursery, coming along nicely, all from last summer's seed. Was it from T and M that you bought your tuber Fenius? If so, there's a possibility that it was from the seed they were sent in which case your tuber could be fertile. They take a couple of years from seed to make a decent tuber which of course can subsequently be divided, as with a dahlia. Even if they have grown on their seedlings and are using them for propagation, the young ones could be fertile. It's worth hand pollinating. I sowed seed in October when frosts were just about finished and these are the result. I see this morning that some already have buds in them!
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that's what I read when I searched seeds http://www.thompson-morgan.com/cosmos-article (http://www.thompson-morgan.com/cosmos-article)
It's an older article but seeds were not to be found on ebay or elsewhere.. Anyway, I ended up ordering it from someone on ebay, not t&m because I'm in greece and I think they only send seeds here.. It's a good sized plant in a 2lt pot, I keep it inside for now and it grows new leaves every day.
I'm gardening on my balconies, Leslie, so I try to stick to the no room for more than one of each species policy but thank you for offering (again! :-*), if I kill it I'll come to you begging for seeds eventually! If I don't and mine sets seeds too I'll spread the word (&seeds!)
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Lesley has some Poppy pictures in the animal thread - it's a long story!! -
http://www.srgc.net/forum/index.php?topic=6476.msg289908#msg289908 (http://www.srgc.net/forum/index.php?topic=6476.msg289908#msg289908)
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Thank you Maggi. I can just hear you saying "this b...... woman' and sighing deeply.
I meant to post this picture earlier then couldn't find it in my pictures, to resize enough to post. So
here it is now but a bit out of season.
Back in October 2011, Davy P sent me some seed of Gladiolus floribundus. It started to flower in Oct 2013, just 2 years after sowing. Not bad! There were 3 stems and another 4 or 5 which haven't bloomed yet. A pretty pale creamy colour with reddish lines and large for the height of the plant, about 15 cms in these seedlings. No seed yet.
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We saw this native eryngium on the road-side yesterday and I plucked a stem to bring home as I didn't have the camera with me (hopefully some seed might ripen as well!)
I think this is Eryngium ovinum, commonly called "Blue devil" and you know it if you aren't careful when handling it - it bites!
The first pic is taken against a background of the imported Eryngium planum (or is it E. maritimum?) which is the third pic,
cheers
fermi
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That's rather nice Fermi. I didn't know Oz had native eryngiums, thought it was a NH genus. Good colour. My 'Picos Blue' is looking super now.
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That's rather nice Fermi. I didn't know Oz had native eryngiums, thought it was a NH genus.
I think that there are soem in South America as well, Lesley.
This is one of our "new" Oriental Liliums, 'Ovation' which is quite tall,
cheers
fermi
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Well now, this is a first for me! 8)
A friend and I took a walk to a patch of undisturbed meadow near my home today and came across several interesting plants in flower despite the 35'C temperature; one striking bulb I hadn't encountered before is Tritonia rubro-lucens visible from some distance due to its bright colour - does anyone grow this bulb in captivity?
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I have something just about the same but not that name. Without a name in fact. It flowered before Christmas though.
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To continue the theme of summer flowers; I have been noticing this little bulb in flower amongst rocks and boulders in or near water courses close to where I live. I am sure it is a Freesia species closely allied to F. laxa, but there are some differences in gross morphology and flower colour. This is a seed-grown specimen in my bulb collection:
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Just to be contrary I am going to return this thread to what are normally regarded as non-summer plants (bar one)
The VERY early flowering crocus - Crocus vallicola
A very mixed up Cyclamen coum - I have left the date stamp on to prove its authenticity.
Some super duper-sized Fritillaria obliqua bulbs - almost the size of spuds!
A very lovely, late-flowering calochortus species - Calochortus plummerae
Cheers, Marcus
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Re eryngiuns: Lesley have you not seen Eryngium agavifolium in NZ? Is E. bromilifolium a synonym, anyone?
cheers, M
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Re eryngiuns: Lesley have you not seen Eryngium agavifolium in NZ? Is E. bromilifolium a synonym, anyone?
cheers, M
Kew Plant List ( which I know not everyone holds with) says :
Eryngium bromeliifolium F.Delaroche is an accepted name
This name is the accepted name of a species in the genus Eryngium (family Apiaceae).
The record derives from WCSP (in review) (data supplied on 2012-03-23) which reports it as an accepted name with original publication details: Eryng. Alep. Hist. 60 1808.
No synonyms are recorded for this name.
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Both Eryngium agavifolium and E. bromilifolium are listed on the Bio Index so both allowed into NZ (as seed) and presumably have been here recently. I don't know of the latter but the former was listed by Parva Plants (formerly of Tauranga but now near Chch) a few years ago and probably will be again sometime. Things that go around come around. I'll order it when I see it. I could get to be quite interested in this genus which, it never occurred to me, belongs to Apiaceae, (thanks Maggi) not obvious from the 'Picos Blue' plants. This has caused much interest over the last couple of months not only from garden visitors but from a truck driver who called in because his cell phone was down and his truck had a problem and he needed a phone, someone else looking for our neighbours and the man who cleans the septic tank! There's no doubt it's one of the most spectacular things here at present seemingly better every day. But I dread the seed being ready and needing to be collected!
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JW in Nova Scotia sent me some seed a while back of a small Dahlia species. Most succumbed to an out of season frost but one seed waited until the spring to germinate and then grew on nicely to make an attractive little plant with rough foliage, very neat and tidy. Here is the first flower. It is about 4cms across and I think the plant will look good with the chocolate cosmos which are in bloom now, and many seeds forming, I'm happy to say, including on the so-called sterile named clones which have been in garden centres last year and the year before. The bees have been at work between those ones and my originals so seed on the lot.
Campanula pulla x zoysii is doing well in a skinny raised bed edging the drive which I started to stop people driving into what will be nursery. I also have the reverse zoysii x pulla but that is much smaller and hasn't flowered yet.
Thymus 'Elfin' is in the same bed and also in a trough (the second picture). It doesn't flower but makes a lovely compact cushion, this one about 12cm across. However now and then a plant will make a sport out the side which flowers well, very low and compact and with the typical perfume of T, serpyllum. 'Elfin' doesn't have much scent at all. I'm doing cuttings of the sport hoping to make a separate. very compact flowering form.
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I don't usually grow annuals as they're too much trouble to replace each year and I don't think they look at ease with more permanent alpine plants. But this year I've had great pleasure from the Tropaeolum (nasturtium) 'Empress of India,' and from a little South Aftrican daisy called Charieis heterophylla, often sold as Felecia bergeriana from which it is quite distinct. I've taken many photos of the Charieis but can't capture the wonderful colour until this morning before the sun came up I managed to get something which showed a pretty good approximation. Here it is along with a rogue seedling which has produced a rich maroon flower instead of the blue. There's also a very dark navy to indigo blue. The blues curl back their petals for the night and unfold again in the morning. For some season neither the maroon nor the dark blue does that but stays wide open all night.
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Two other annuals going strong at present are the dark purple Papaver somniferum and a little quite prostrate sweet pea called 'Pink Cupid.' This has been around in New Zealand for at least 50 years I think, first being distributed from the NZAGS seedlist where it was known to all as "Bunty's Pea" since it was the seedlist director of the time, Bunty Roi who spread it around. Just within the last year or so, it has been redistributed as simply 'Cupid' and said to have been bred by an Auckland breeder of numerous showy plants but this is definitely identical to Bunty's original. The person concerned is the one who claims to have developed the fertile choc cosmos seed too. I'd like to have a good chat with said person one day!!!!
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I should have said the Lathyrus plants are only about 10-12 cms high and spread to about 50 cms each. I planted out 20 seedlings to make a carpet over Cyclamen coum but that is already coming through. What a silly season we are having! The flower stems are about 12 cms long and the two tone flowers have the typical, wonderful sweet pea fragrance.
All these annuals mentioned above, (Troaeolum, Papaver, Charieis, Lathyrus,) are setting excellent seed. If anyone would like some, let me know.
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Great to hear Lesley. We lost ours in the horrendously wet summer of 2011, friends did as well. So this Dahlia may very well only exist in abundance in the southern hemisphere now.
The flower is identical to the original but does it have the chocolate fragrance - evening think was best or was that sunset only?
Over-wintering was also a great problem. Ken says leaving the tuber in its pot and keeping it bone dry was successful whereas bare-rooting was disastrous. How have you been handling it? I hope a few other people have it as well.
johnw - where we await a blizzard.
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Thanks Lesley for lots of lovely pictures and interesting observations.
In a rush but Lesley's post got me out to snap a few things in the garden.
Eryngium Picos Blue is stunning at present but sun strong so could only manage a couple of flowers in the shade.
Eryngium Violetta has been incredible but now on the wan.
Bloomeria crocea - might be a different name but I guess someone will enlighten me.
Origanum dictamnus - sun too strong for a good shot but its seems to like the conditions.
Cheers, Marcus
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Lovely to see a genuine Origanum dictamnus. I lost mine a few years ago and the replacements I've bought have all been O. tournefortii, another good one, but larger and not so woolly/white.
John, I kept mine bone dry in a pot this last winter and just as well I think as it rained and rained and rained all through. The previous winter before we moved it was in a smaller pot and not arid but still sheltered and frost free under shade cloth. I don't think it's as hardy as the choc cosmos so before I move it out to join that, I might wait and divide the tuber, as an insurance. I haven't sniffed at it yet but will do so. Right now in fact as it's about 8pm and the sun is shining after a tropical downpour around 4-5pm.
Mmmm... not really, or very faintly and sweeter rather than bitter choc as in the comos. The rain has washed it out rather and the single flower is coming to its end I think. I did pollinate it this morning but there was no visible pollen on my finger so whether it will work I've yet to see. Seed for you if it does.
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We are trying a whole range of origanums out on the new Mediterranean bed with winter cover. Never succeeded well with O. dictamnus so far but it is a fine plant when you see it growing well. Really looking forward to this spring when the bed can be uncovered and we will see how well everything grows away.
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This Epidendron is flowering in the front garden now.
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Wow!!!
Eye-burning and impressive Anthony!
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Lesley - Pass the seed on to forumists as I have had my go at it. As best as I remember the first year there was no pollen but the following it was copious and by hand-pollinating it produced a goodly amount of seed.
I wonder if a species name has ever surfaced as it was collected wild in Mexico.
johnw
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We have lots of origanums here. They obviously like the dry conditions. I have a batch of self sown seedlings resulting from random crosses between Kent Beauty and Barbara Tingey and one of them is about to be released as a PBR plant under the name of Bellissimo.
Anyway here are a few more pics. They are not of good quality because the sun is too strong even from very early in the morning.
O. amanum - an excellent species which should be more widely grown here.
O. rotundifolium - a variegated form which is so long-lasting.
O. Bellissimo
And finally a random seedling which is almost identical to Kent Beauty.
Cheers, Marcus
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We have lots of origanums here.....And finally a random seedling which is almost identical to Kent Beauty.
Cheers, Marcus
I have to disagree with you there, Marcus, :o
it looks much better!!! ;D
Can't wait to get a couple of these! Will they be released through an Agent on the Mainland North Island?
cheers
fermi
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Hi Fermi,
Yes it's going all over the place starting in Australia and then New Zealand, Europe and hopefully the USA. In Australia it's sold through PMA.
I am hoping the variegated plant will be picked up but its less of a sure thing. They are such great container plants with very long lasting colour so they practical pick themselves as a good mass market item.
I find Origanum dictamnus a beast to propagate. Anyone have any tips that they can pass on?
Cheers, M
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Superb plant Marcus, and brilliantly named. Do you grow the white form of O. amanum? This is a nice robust hybrid from Marina Christopher - Origanum 'Phoenix seedling' which will be interesting to compare with 'Kent Beauty'.
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hello, sorry to intrude from beyond the Wall but while you're on the subject, could you id mine too please?? I'll delete the post after!!
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hello, sorry to intrude from beyond the Wall but while you're on the subject, could you id mine too please?? I'll delete the post after!!
I'm sure your plant ID will be of interest to others, Fenia, and not just in North or South :D
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:) Ok then, I'll leave it up to you to move it later to the ids if you want, I put it here because there seem to be a lot of origanum experts!
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Marcus , your Origanum 'Bellissimo ' is a stunner and aptly named .
I find cuttings of O. dictamnus taken in early summer strike reasonable easy in a medium of peat , perlite and coarse sand .
I think I gave it to you many years ago .
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My Acis autumnalis sown in January 2012 continues to flower, and my Nerine has produced four flowering stems from three bulbs, one now being past.
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My Acis autumnalis sown in January 2012 continues to flower, and my Nerine has produced four flowering stems from three bulbs, one now being past.
Anthony,
The Acis flower is a quick and beautiful result - nice Nerine also!
Gerd
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The O. 'Bellissimo' is a real find Marcus. Is it yours? and how is it going to be in NZ? If this, why not other things?
I have only about a 50% success rate with rooting ANY origanum cuttings tho' rooted stems pulled from the base of the plants are easier, especially with rotundifolium and tournefortii. However, even the cuttings which do root successfully are almost all lost at or soon after potting on. I've just about given up propagating them though I get the occasional seedling appearing.
Fenius, yours looks perhaps like a dictamnus hybrid. Is this likely. They do hybridize quite readily and yours does seem quite woolly and reasonably dwarf. It's a possibility. :-\
I've yet again missed three new flowers on Gelasine azurea. They seem to last only for perhaps an hour and I ALWAYS miss out. Gathered 29 seeds today from two heads of Tecophilaea cyanocrocus, the first seeds I've ever had of it. I'll photograph it tomorrow for the seed ID thread. Graph paper has to be located first. Greedily, I'm going to sow the lot. :o
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Hi,
At last I have finished lifting the summer catalogue bulbs and I can sort of relax for a couple of weeks.
Thanks Lesley, Tim, Fermi and Otto for your kind words. Yes the plant is mine, well I own the PBR but others get it into the big wide world of commerce. This process has direct reference to some of the things I have been saying on the Regulatory Threats Thread. Only the big boys can negotiate the system but the plants ..... they come from all sorts of places ... including the niche market nurseries. If that sector dries up then a major source of new material is lost .... so its in the big boys' interest not to let that happen.
How do they get to NZ? Easy, they come as little bits of sterile, un-rooted tissue culture material in a little flask Lesley. The days of transporting real plants has gone.
I concur with Lesley re origanum dictamnus. Otto you must be holding out on a trick or you have a very easy-going plant. I took 50 cuttings in late spring before there was any sign flowering. I ended up with 5 rooted cuttings, I now have 1 potted plant left. I leave you to draw your own conclusions. I find origanums generally difficult, although amanum and rotundifolium are better than most. But dictamnus, because I suspect of its brittle, woolly stems, is a no go zone. I did note with eye-popping interest that David Glenn of Lambley Nursery, in Victoria, where Otto lives offered it for sale last year.
Fenius, because there have been a lot of origanums shown on this thread recently I wouldn't class us (well me) as experts. But I do concur with Lesley's opinion.
Cheers, Marcus
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Hi Tim,
No I don't grow the white form of O. amanum and I suspect I never will. I think us Australians are stuck with what we now have because of the brutal cost of biosecurity compliance. The only new material will be a mass produced clone a la my little chap or something arising from the gene pool we now have. Of course there is always the overseas seed route.
Cheers, M
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Thanks Lesley and Marcus! Today it's finally snowing here, I'm so happy to see snow on roof tiles and cars and bare branches again! I think it's been at least two years..
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Hi Fenius,
I note you live in Thessaloniki. Did you purchase your plant at a nursery there?
BTW I really enjoyed your city when I visited a couple of years ago.
Cheers, Marcus
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Nothing as exciting as those oreganoes here, but this is a new "aggie" for us, it's called Agapanthus 'Blue Diamond'
cheers
fermi
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Hi Fermi,
Susan I were only just talking on the weekend about these plants. They are so beautifully architectural and a fine cut flower but I guess I have such a problem with them romping about too much I regard them as a nuisance. I guess its what you choose and where one plants them.
I have posted a picture of a plant I love, Euphorbia segeuriana. It is such a wonderful summer bloomer and, like the aggies, provides a strong architectural presence. I collected as seed in Greek Macedonia a few years ago and it hasn't looked back. Surprisingly it isn't available elsewhere in Australia.
Cheers, Marcus
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Hi Fenius,
I note you live in Thessaloniki. Did you purchase your plant at a nursery there?
BTW I really enjoyed your city when I visited a couple of years ago.
Cheers, Marcus
Hey Marcus,
glad to hear you liked it here! I did in fact get my origanum at a nursery here, it's been a pretty long lived plant too (from all those I've tried so far in pots) ..I think I've only come across this variety here ( sometimes with bigger or smaller leaves but then again that might be due to culture conditions as the flowers always look exactly the same)