Australian and New Zealand Gardening: Bromeliads for novices & addicts, October 2012, 4 by perke_patch

perke_patch wrote:
Hi everyone. thought I'd pop in early tonight instead of waiting till I'm ready for bed.

I think you'll all find that the pic posted of billbergia ALAN LADD is the one owned by Ross Little and not purchased by anyone on this forum. I doubt if any of us could afford the price Ross wants for a pup of this plant. Nev, I too was lucky enought to get a DARK LADD (pic 1) out of Ross. But one I really wanted besides b. ALAN LADD was one called b.MAURIE'S LADD. (see pic 2).

Nev thanks for the tip on shoots, roots, & fruits. I think I'll remember that now when looking at the NPK ratio on fertilisers. although I just rechecked and i had roots & shoots round the wrong way so 'up down and around' might be a better reminder. I'll also file away the metho & ammonia hint for future. at the moment the big pest we have here is the caterpillas hatching which will be butterflies one day if they stay off our broms. the flowering vriseas and guzmanias seem to be their main target and they can make a mess of a nice plant. I hate having to squish them or feed them to the nepenthes but we can't have them destroying our plants.

Pic 3 & 4 I just had to share with you. I usually grow neo golden chalice in a full sun and get very deep yellow plants with a lot of red patches ont very tall thin tubes. Last week I discovered this pot of it growing out th front under the shadecloth and was amazed to see it was golden chalice. this shows a much shorter fatter nicer shape but not nearly as much yellow colour and hardly any red patches. pity we can't get the shape like this with the colour of the sun grown one. but if I had to choose which one I prefer I think it would have to be the shade grown one. I tried to get rid of 2 pots of the sun grown one on the weekend but couldn't get anyone interested. I think this one would have been easier to sell.

Wendy