Australian and New Zealand Gardening: BROMELIADS FOR NOVICES AND ADDICTS - JULY 2014, 5 by splinter1804

splinter1804 wrote:
Hi everyone – I don't know what the weather's like where you all live but it's been pretty chilly down here. Yesterday was a beautiful sunny day but there was still that very cold breeze blowing all day just t spoil it, and as soon as the sun starts to go down, well that's when the “Ice Man” starts doing his rounds as we're having very cold nights with quite a bit of cold damage to some of the soft leaved brom's.

Shirley – I had a similar problem when I used Weld Mesh fence panels on my benches; they were fine for the larger pots, but I was continually picking up the smaller ones which kept tipping over. In the end I covered the mesh with 1/2” bird wire. I'm now changing to “Mini Orb” as my son and his two next door neighbours are putting up two new fences and the old ones were made of “Mini Orb”.

(For those who don't know what this is, it was called “Bird Iron” when I was a boy and was corrugated iron but with a small corrugations. It was made originally to prevent birds from getting under the corrugations of the standard corrugated iron and into the cavity between the roof and the ceiling of early houses)

It's now used for many other things such as feature walls and other projects. Anyway the Mini Orb from the fences was a bit rusty on the bottom six inches and it was all going to the tip until I volunteered to take it off their hands. Out came the portable circular saw and a cutting disc and I cut off the bottom six inches from each sheet and “hey presto” enough to cover all of my benches free of charge. You may remember last year I trialled it on the benches in the top shade house and everything is growing great (and not falling over) so I've decided to now do the lot. I got the original idea when looking at some pic's of Thai growers' shade houses where they use corrugated asbestos roofing sheets on their benches.

I've had the same problem as you many times when I've taken plants off a bench to repair it and when it's time to put the plants back, there never seems to be enough room.

Great plants in your pictures once again but my two favourites are Neo.'Walking Tall' and Neo.'Thelma's Choice'. Neo.'Walking Tall' is a beautifully shaped what seems to be a medium/small sized Neo. and bred from Neo.'Small World' by Grace Goode.

My next favourite is Neo.'Thelma's Choice' which I haven't seen before, but it certainly caught my eye immediately and being of a curious nature I just had to look it up on the BCR and wasn't really surprised to see that it had been bred by Chester Skotak. It's from an unusual crossing of Neo. (carolinae x 'Royal Burgundy') and Neo. marmorata.which is a species.

Jean – It's so nice to hear from you again and learn that you are gradually coming to terms with all the changes in your life. What you say about hubby never throwing anything away in case it may come in handy one day is a habit that all of us old blokes have. It's just that blokes are natural “hoarders” and their wives are the “chuckers”. It's really uncanny how many times my wife has talked me in to letting her chuck out something I've been saving for years only to find a need for it a couple of days after it was tossed. The only answer is of course, don't toss it as you'll find a use for it eventually. I've lost count of the number of time my kids have come over looking for something to do a job with (it might be a bracket, a screw, a bolt or an odd shaped hinge or something) and sure enough, it will be in my shed somewhere.

As hubby obviously knew the house would be to much for you to manage alone, I think you're doing the right thing thinking about moving to an independent living unit. As you say, you can still have a few plants. You don't have to worry about maintenance which is a big thing also. A friend of ours lives in one of these units with just a small court yard and she too had a large collection of brom's before she moved and had to unload them.

What she did once she was settled again was to “downsize” and she just bought mini Neo's and Tillandsias and I was amazed at how many she had fitted into such a small space. Someone had given her a second hand security door which she had painted and attached to the brick wall of the back of the unit. On this door she has her collection of Tillys hanging with little wire hooks and it's amazing just how many she has in that small space. The Mini Neo' are located on a couple of small shelves and once again it's amazing how many are fitted into a small area. So you see, you have various option with your plants that don't take up a lot of space, and being the type of person you are, I'm sure you'll work out a suitable system for staying with some of your plants. Once you are settled, drop me a line and I'll send you a few mini types to get you started. And please keep dropping in to D.G. as time allows, because we love to hear from you.

Teresa – I hope you are getting over your cold bug and things aren't too cold (weather wise) down there.

I'll finish today with a few examples of different Tillandsias for Jean just to plant the “thought seed” in her head for the future. As I've said many times in the past, there's a brom for all situations.
Pic. 1 Till. straminea, Pic.2 Till brachycaulis, Pic.3 Till. fuchsii, Pic.4 Till. dugesii, Pic.5 Till. pueblensis

All the best, Nev.