Australian and New Zealand Gardening: Bromeliads for Novices and Addicts - September 2014, 5 by splinter1804

splinter1804 wrote:
Good morning all – Well Trish anyway; where have you all gone?

Sorry to hear you and Joe have been crook Trish but it sounds like things are now on the mend, so you both need to take a step back and slow down a bit.

I know this next bit is “off topic”, but as we’ve had a few brom friends sick recently, I think it’s appropriate under the circumstances that I share this with you.

They say hard work never killed anyone and that is the biggest lie ever written, maybe the hard work won’t kill you “directly” but it can do “indirectly” because as the extra hours of “all work and no play” take effect, your body’s resistance begins to falter and before you know it you start to feel abnormally tired and then perhaps an occasional headache. This is a sign of your body’s resistance to health problems beginning to weaken.

As this progresses, your immunity to these minor health problems is reduced making you more at risk of other problems and your susceptibility to picking up a bacterial or viral infection (or both) increases. First it may be the common cold, then a sore throat or ear ache which can both advance to infections. As these progress, they can in turn lead to more serious infections of the lung/s and possibly pleurisy or pneumonia which if not treated effectively can ultimately lead to death; and all of this because you overworked yourself.

Many of these problems can be traced back initially to starting with the common cold, and as I haven’t had a cold since I was twelve years old, I just want to pass on the preventative treatment I use, and that’s oranges; one a day every day.

I almost died of bronchial pneumonia (which started as a common cold) when I was twelve and the doctor was coming twice a day to give massive injections of Tetracycline (which was a new "wonder drug" at that time); eventually it worked and I was cured. This doctor's advice to me was, "eat an orange a day for the rest of your like and you'll never get another cold". I took his advice and I've never had another cold.

Oranges help to act as a tonic and work on the human body in much the same way as Seasol works on brom’s , it’s as simple as that. They have many health benefits which are well worth reading about at: http://www.care2.com/greenliving/13-health-benefits-of-orang...

Now back to brom talk; I like the pic's of the seedlings which look much better now that I've saved them and turned them around. (It's probably worth mentioning to Brian and any other "newbies" looking in, that this sort of thing happens occasionally when we post pic's; it seems to be some sort of "glitch" in the programme which eventually rectifies itself)

Now to your seedlings; I always enjoy looking at the results of my work, especially when they've been grown well and given the type of care you provide. I can see improvement in them every time you post pic's and now that they are gaining a bit of size we can see some of the desirable traits we want in seedlings such as broadening of the leaves and development of colour which will only improve as they grow larger; so keep up the good work and I hope you are rewarded with one or two nice ones.

Not much brom news to talk about today; we had a reasonable meeting yesterday however numbers were down as many of our members have colds and associated illnesses as well. Today will be spent coming down the “home run” as I prepare the plants I have decided to exhibit in our show. I hadn’t intended to exhibit, but as exhibitor numbers will be down this year it’s only fair that we all try our best to help put on a show to promote these wonderful plants to the public.

Time to go again and I’ll leave you with some pic’s of variegated Neo’s today just for a change. Pic.1 is Neo.’Bevvie Bee’, Pic.2 is Neo. carolinae spiralis, Pic.3. Neo.’carolinae x ‘Painted Lady’, Pic.4 Neo.’Orange Glow’ and Pic.5 Neo. ‘Meyendorffii variegata’

All the best, Nev.