Australian and New Zealand Gardening: bromeliads for novices and addicts, sep, 2012, 1 by splinter1804

splinter1804 wrote:
Hi everyone,

I’m still sorting out things after the show and I didn’t realize what a mess I’d left things in in my rush to get everything ready. Oh well, if I’m not sorting this out I’d have something else I needed to do as there’s always some sort of work to be done around the place.

Jean – The colour in your Hallelujah is great. In my opinion, it’s still one of the all-time great Billbergia hybrids which is being used a lot in breeding now as it passes on its colour as well as its vigour to most of its progeny. I have seen a lot of seedlings where it is a parent and they look almost as good, but I have yet to see one better. (Maybe there is one, but I haven’t seen it).

I just thought I’d mention that it’s not just the shade that will turn them green; using a fertilizer that’s high in Nitrogen will give the same result, so remember just a little fertilizer with a higher Potassium content than Nitrogen if you want to maintain vigour and colour.

Karen – Thanks for the explanation about what’s been happening with my posts. You are right on the mark as I often start typing early in the morning and then go and have some breakfast before returning and finishing it off.

Ian – Seems like you’re really getting into the seed sowing. Just a little tip if you don’t already know it; most people who are starting out in this area always sow too much seed (we’ve probably all done it) which results in very overcrowded seedlings. This slows down growth and makes it difficult when “thinning out” time comes. So when sowing, try and spread them around to avoid clumping.

I can’t help you much with your complicated Alcantarea name; I do know that Alcantarea ‘Regina’ is a species from Brazil but as for the rest of it I have no idea except to say that alba means white (which you probably already knew anyway). If you go to the FCBS site at http://fcbs.org/ and then open “Bromeliad Information” which is listed in the index on the left of the home page. When it opens, select and open the first heading “Glossary”. If you have hours of spare time and good eyes, this will tell you the meaning of every bromeliad term. It also helps if you have a Latin dictionary as well and that the words you are looking for are correctly spelled. As we all know, over time, names on name tags often become corrupted due to ink fading or broken labels and what is written on them is often very far from what was written originally.

You say you are using Potassium on your young seedlings “to help with their roots”, in what form are you using it liquid or solid? As for the parentage of Tristus X Fosperior; Tristis is a Brazilian species and Fosperior is a hybrid supposedly from two species, Fosteriana crossed with Spectabilis. Your Aechmea NOID in pic 3 could be Ae. Burgundy, but I can’t be sure until I see a flower.

Shirley – Thanks for the explanation about the computer query, and you’re dead right; it was the F5 key that did the trick, so thanks a lot.

You did well at the markets, all nice plants, but I would advise you to have a very close look at the Billbergia as I think I can see a bit of Flyspeck scale on it. I can’t be certain as I’m only looking at a pic. but if you aren’t familiar with what it looks like, it’s best described as looking like shiny black poppy seed only slightly smaller. It’s not the major drama that a lot of people make it out to be, but it can spread quickly in the warmer climates if not controlled. The best control is to separate it from your other plants and treat it with Confidor; preferably by dipping the whole plant in a bucket. Keep it quarantined from your other plants for a month and then scrape off the dead scale and look for any new ones. Billbergias seem to be more prone to this pest as it gets down inside the tube and is hard to see until it has spread to the outer leaves. There is an article about this pest in one of our past society newsletters, see http://www.bromeliad.org.au/news/Ill0408.htm.

Wendy – Yes my camera does have a removable storage disc but it was just because of a combination of laziness and ignorance that I let the pic’s accumulate. I had already downloaded them to my computer but it never occurred to me to delete them once I had done so. Everything on the computer is also backed up on an external hard drive as well so there was really no point in leaving them in the camera, anyway it’s all sorted now as I deleted them yesterday and now I can start to fill it up all over again.

Sue – Sorry I didn’t mean to confuse things by combining two days in the one post but as you say it’s so busy here lately that it takes forever to read everything and isn’t that great! A friend of mine called Bruce who says he knows you from his Facebook site lives up your way and intends to visit you when he can arrange it. I think it would be good to also get him onto this site as I’ve known him for a long time and can vouch for him but don’t know what’s required for him to join us so could you please sort him out. As for the show, well as I said I didn’t enter with the object of getting awards, just putting in plants to help fill the tables. As it turned out I needn’t have bothered as all the other members “went the extra yard” and brought in plants as well and in the end we had more plants than we had space for. Even my mate Bruce (who has been a member for some time) brought down a trailer load from where he lives (I think up near Coffs Harbour somewhere).

Be a bit careful about “hubby” getting interested in the gardens too, he may just have an ulterior motive like building a trail bike track through them! I’m pleased you were able to sort out Ian’s naming problem. I’m afraid it’s all getting a bit over my head as I was never really into that side of brom growing.

I have to go now as I think I’m getting RSI of the wrist from too much typing Ha! Ha!

I’ll finish with a few pic’s. - The first is Neo Pretatress as I promised Ian yesterday(unfortunately just a pup) but it does show the colours we get down here with lower light intensities. The next two are a couple of random Vrieseas fom the show and the last two are my modest little "Table Top Display" at our show about the "Life Cycle of a Neoregelia"

All the best, Nev.