Australian and New Zealand Gardening: BROMELIADS FOR MARCH ....2014, 3 by splinter1804

splinter1804 wrote:
Hi everyone – Well at least the two of you and it's good to see you back Shirley as it's been a bit awkward trying to keep things going here with very few posts. Wendy's been helping out even though she's away as have Trish, Theresa and Ian who all have their own problems to deal with at present.

Anyway the weekend's here again and hopefully you are all getting finer weather than we are down here, as it's still raining as I write. The weather forecaster said last night that over the weekend the rain was going to move up the coast to southern coastal Queensland, so I hope you don't get it too severe.

I had a D-Mail from Colleen and the reason we haven't heard from her is that she's done her back in again and she's unable to do anything and its only now she was able to spend a few minutes on the computer but even that aggravated things and she had to stop. Fortunately she has a sister nearby who has been running the show for her and doing the housework, feeding the boys as well as the chooks and other animals. She says she's been able to get to the chiropractor for a session and he's helped her a lot but still needs more treatments. Anyway she said she'll be back posting again as soon as she can and says g'day to all of you.

Wendy – It seems the “D.G. Gremlin” may have been at your computer and ate your post, what other explanation could there be?

Good to hear you got among the fish and were able to freeze a good supply. Nothing like a nice feed of fresh fish just cooked simply without any buggering about with them.

Good news on the excess seedling front as I have found a temporary home to grow them on for at least another 18 months, so that at least will give me some breathing space and save me from binning them and possibly destroying some good plants. Thanks for the offer of finding them a home at Hervey Bay Wendy, but I won't need to send them north now, and besides the postage would have cost a fortune anyway.

What exactly is a “costas rubra“, is it type of ginger? I've never seen anything resembling that down here so I'm assuming it's a tropical plant, but then you know what happens when we assume don't you. Ha! Ha! So tell me and put me out of my misery.

Shirley - It's great to hear you both had such a terrific holiday down south in the “land of the long white cloud”. I've never been there myself but any friends who have all rave about how beautiful it is. What's more they grow great brom's there as well, especially Vrieseas, Alcantareas, Neoregelias and Billbergias. There's some great new hybrids coming out of New Zealand lately and no doubt there will be many more in the future.

I know you've only been away from home for a couple of weeks, but don't the plants seem to grow quickly when you don't look at them each day? I know when ever we came home from holidays everything seemed to have doubled in size while we were away, (including the grass and the weeds).

Isn't it great to see the reaction of your dogs when you come home again, it's just so obvious how happy they are to see you. It was like this when we came home to our dogs also (except one that is). When the kids were small we had two dogs, one of which was a little Foxie, and when ever we came home, (even after just a long weekend break) the brown dog would jump all over us and race madly around the yard to show how happy he was to see us, but the little Foxie would just give what seemed to be a “dirty Look” and just turn her back and ignore us for some time until we had petted her a bit just like we were apologising for going away and not taking her with us. She did this every time and I'm sure she was so spoilt she just did it to make us feel guilty for leaving her at home.

So as you say, back home, and back to the “grind” of everyday life once again.

The pic's I'll finish with today are firstly a Guz. sanguinea poking its heads out of very over-crowded bit of the garden. Pic.2 shows a few of the hanging plants in part of the yard just after the rain, Pic.3 is a few more of my very overcrowded seedlings, Pic.4 is a few of the seedling starting to colour up and Pic 5 is one I bought as a pup and was supposed to be Neo.”Blue Heeler' but I very much doubt that it's true to name.

All the best, Nev.