Australian and New Zealand Gardening: BROMELIADS FOR NOVICES & ADDICTS - NOVEMBER 2012, 4 by perke_patch

perke_patch wrote:
I should have stayed to post my comments instead of folding the washing and putting it away. when I posted I saw that another post had been made while I was typing but there were several to read. Ian I agree that Shirley's 2nd pic is aechmea nudicaulis.

Ian your pic 4 reminded me that we have several lovely portea petropolitania flowering at the moment. when we pull up in front of our house now there are flower spikes sticking up over the fence everywhere. we have lots of people in cars and buses craneing for a look over the fence at the brom. If we have the gate open they pull up and look in. blanchetianas and porteas as well as lovely coloured neos everywhere over the fence.

Shirley we do have Hohenbergia leopoldo-horstii growing here. It is right inside the front gate in a totem with the plant sticking out into the sun. It wasn't doing well with a pup on the side so I took the pup off as I didn't want to lose it. Since then the main plant has grown and thrived and is looking so nice. We also have neo noble descent which we grow in the full sun along the front fence. The lovely yellow red colours look so good against the white fence. We also have break of day and solar flare here. however as you know trying to find a certain plant in our yard is often difficult however solar flare does have a colour that stands out. If I find one I'll put it somewhere safe for when you come down again.

pic 1 is Hohenbergia leopoldo-horstii for shirley
pic 2 is neo medusa spineless. we have a tray of these just colouring up at the moment. we have always kept these in one single place together as they seem to be scale magnets and therefore require spraying more often than other neos. we nearly got rid of all of them but as they are colouring up now they do look lovely.
pic 3 is neo little rosita. this is a small medium sized neo which looks good clumping up. they are looking stunning at present with all the lovely colour.
pic 4 is my christmas tree of mini neo fireball. this pic was last year and it is now much thicker although I did see Johnny taking cuttings off it last week. must go look at it tomorrow. also because of where it has been growing all year only one side is nice and red. other side against the seedling shelf is less coloured. mst pull it out of there tomorrow and check it out for a pic.

well this time I'm off to bed. take care everyone and I hope you all have healthy eyes tonight and didn't try to look at that sun this morning. alas I didn't wake up and so only saw it on fb pics and on the news tonight. I do remember one time as a kid when we had a solar eclipse and the day went darker then brighter again. Can't remember how old I was and even where we were when it happened as that would have told me the approx age I was. ah well 16 or 18 years doesn't seem too long away. maybe I'll see another one???

Night
Wendy