Tropical Gardening

New thread available for What's Looking Exotic in October 2013 - in case you want to mark it as "watched"

Added :-

Thanks upsydasy . The next door neighbours have a young son . He'll be 3 soon . Did it for him .

Thanks salamander,its in the greenhouse now as im not sure on its hardiness or age so il keep it safe for now til i find some info on it bought it from The lost world nursery thou they didnt have a lot of stock online last time i looked.

?? Never was fluent in Gibberish

Looks like a good idea to me @mowgley . Those stems dont look nearly strong enough, to me, to survive the winter even if wrapped.As its not that big, better to be safe than sorry.

This from a thread on HTUK:"I can tell you they don't like temperatures between 10-15c or being kept on the dry side. Given quite a few away and I'm left with one and thats looking ropey! Seems to me they have to have a minimum winter temp of 19c, be kept moist and as much light as...

Lovely pics BM! I love the iris but unfortunately we never have much luck with them, they bloom one year and then that is the end of them. Have the same bad luck with several other flowering plants. Soil not right, bugs, not enough care, I don't know, so I give up after a couple of years.

To me the top and bottom parts look like babies. The stump in the middle looks like this years spent tuber. So I would be hoping for two vines next year with three or four tubers for 2016 by the end of the season.

I think it gets pretty cold in winter where it comes from, but at the same time, its probably dryer and spring comes a bit earlier, with a guaranteed summer.

Joolz , wait.... to my expirience they tend to have roots rotting very easy in cold and wet .

Just thought some people would like to know that of the 3 varieties of Banana seeds I planted on 6 January this year I have one that has germinated. It's a Musa Mannii, so hopefully, there may be more. To be honest, I didn't have really high hopes of any of the seeds germinating especially...

Pete - I have never had a flowering Strelitzia. Where exactly do the flower shoots come from. Is it from every leaf axil? and do you just get one flower per axil? Do you also get flowers from the outside axils which are younger, or just the central ones?

Thanks again Kristen. I don't have time to build one so it's going on my birthday/fathers day list

Recent research has shown that cannabis smoking has a greater deleterious effect if done when a teenager than when older. It isn't to do with length of time it's been used but the fact that it affects the maturing of the brain. It causes more permanent disorientation.

Thats my problem Pete, I am what i call a "fluffy" gardener.I have nearly everything in pots and a very small area for growing directly into the soil. I am never armed with a spade

I thought I didn't succeed. Please let meknow

I know it's a bit late about starting seed but I start mine with boiling water I put them in a cup and pour over fresh boiled water till you hear a popping then pour out the water and put in cold water and get great germination rates

That's really kind of you Pete...

Naw! It's a large leaf with a bird standing on it - specifically to illustrate the size of the leaf.As soon as I'd taken the picture I told him he could fly away