Australian and New Zealand Gardening: BROMELIADS FOR NOVICES & ADDICTS JULY & AUGUST 2012, 1 by springer99

springer99 wrote:
Great info on here as usual :) So does Vr Tiger Tim do the same as ospinae Var Gruberi? We have Splenriet which does this, but we only got one pup on each of our two mothers after flowering so didn't attempt removing them, just let them take over as the new growing centre. I was told, if you tie the spike to the opposite side, you will often make it throw another pup or two on the opposite side, where the light gets in. It didn't happen for us though. Our Werauhia sanguinolenta rubra has finnished flowering and hopefully is setting some seeds, so I expect a pup to for to take over the growing centre on that one too.
Mike I live on the coast and yes we use quincan (scoria) as a growing medium with a bit of coir chunks in it and I'm thinking about adding charcoal as well. Someone else I know just up the range on the tablelands, (30 mins away) uses straight river gravel, nothing else and her broms are very nice. Our biggest problem up here is well.... two fold..... the mix often gets too dry and tempts you into moving to something that retains more moisture, but then we get the wet season and it rains for 3 months with high humidity and everything rots out if it's too wet. So going off other growers experience as I've only been growing for about 18 mths now, is that it's better to have a dry mix and water more, than have a wet mix and massive rot issues.
This does become frustrating in summer, as that's our wet season, and it's either stinking hot with close enough to 100% humidity or it pouring down. For the weeks when it doesn't rain and it's incredibly hot, even with lots of shadecloth the actual heat starts to burn and wreck the broms, so you end up having to water lightly every 2 hours during the day, especially the vrieseas to keep them happy. Summer is honestly a crappy time of year up here for broms, they end up under close to 100% shade cloth to save them from frying and even then some still fall victim.
Winter is awesome up here, doesn't usually get below 15 degrees, nothing stops growing, any extra shadecloth from summer comes down and the colours look amazing. LOVE Winter up here. By memory it's about November or early December that we have to put up extra layers of shadecloth inside the brom house and over gardens etc or you will come home to brown and crispy things only identifiable by the tag sticking out of the pot.
Well I hope everyone has a great weekend lined up, I don't think we are up to much, just a few things around home.
Cheers Tash