Bromeliads for novices and addicts, Jan-Feb 2011

Not sure if this is the start of a flower or not on Til. caput meduse. I have another large till that is putting out 2 babies.
Jean.

Jean, I love Tillandsias, and you have some lovely ones there.

Wendy, I suspect that till is a Neglecta too, but as I've lost the tags I am not sure.

The fish net ball was a bit small, as I got 10 plants off that one, and there are still babies attached to the original stem. So I've put them on my loofah instead. It wasn't easy getting them into it as the fibres are strong, but I am hoping that now they are in, those same strong fibres will keep them there. There is plenty of room for them to multiply.

Karen

My Vr. Splenriet is getting a pup! I am so excited. Is it better to remove the pup, or let it grow on where it is? How big does it have to be before I remove it? Wendy, if it has to be removed, I'll be paying you a visit when its ready as I wouldn't dare do it myself, not the first one.

Karen

Karen I love your loofah of tills. Well done. Splenriet is one of those broms where you just about have to destroy the plant to get the pups off so wait till the flowering is over and the pups are a good size before trying totake them off. When the pups are a good size bring the plant over and we will help you take them.

Jean I love your tills. I am still building my collection of tills. I love them, they don't take too much room and look really good. There are so many ways you can display them. I guess I love the creative side of collecting tills ie displaying them. I discovered another one today that I didn't even know I had. I was taking pups off the fasiculatas and discovered that one of them wasn't. I can't remember the name right now but it is not even on my spreadsheet. The label said it was a vrisea but one look and I knew it was a till, so did Johnny. It had flowered recently too and I just thought it was a fasiculata and ignored it. Wish we could turn back time so I could see it again. Will have to wait for next pup to flower now.

Jen I hope you have a lovely holiday for next 2 weeks. I am so jealous that you will be going to Jack's on the way back home. I wish I had thought to give you $50 to bring me back a vrisea baby from him. We'll just have t do a trip down south very soon too and pick up one ourselves. Anyhow see you in a couple weeks. Enjoy.

Wendy

Thanks Wendy. She just has the one pup at the moment, and the flower is almost done. I will wait until the pup is larger and then pay you a visit.

Off to Nambour today. Nothing to do with plants though. Looks like its going to be a hot one.

Have a great weekend all. Jen, I hope you have a lovely holiday too.

Karen

Karen, the loofah is a brilliant idea. :)

Nice collection of Tillandsias Jean. Lucky you, to have so many coming up to flower.

Thankyou Pam. Well, our trip to Nambour was called off. The people we were going to see are coming down to Brisbane instead. This is good, as I wasn't sure I would be up to a long drive with this chest cold. So it works out well.

Karen

A visit to a nursery we hadn't been to before at Redland Bay. Lagoon View Nursery. Thousands of plants there, many varieties. No Hoyas though. I asked.

Got this lovely brom NOID because of the markings. They had others I would like to get one day too, but nothing really outstanding. No vrieseas.

Karen

Hi Karen. That plant is an Aechmea 'Bert". We have them in trees and in pots, in the sun and the shade. In the sun you get shades of yellow and pink in the full shade they are more green with brown markings. They are very popular.

We've been going around th whole garden cleaning plants, moving old mothers, removing pups & dumping some mothers and cutting off some mothers to leave pups in pot. We have discovered so many aechmeas flowering though so have the displays we needed. This week we will be busy setting up, moving plants and pricing them. Hopefully we will have a lot of space when we clear them out next weekend.

Hope to see you all here next Saturday for our open garden.

Wendy

Thanks Wendy. I imagine you are going to be busy this week. I hope we can get there Saturday. Depends on Barry though.

The aechmeas tend to have rather vicious little spikes on the leaves, don't they. Ae. Bert is nicely marked though so I had to add it to my collection.

Karen

We cleaned the sales area today, removing leaves, cleaning pots, topping with bark and pricing. We were stunned at the number of pots missing their name tags. Well over half of them have no names. Far too many to be just NOIDs or forgotten IDs. Some were obvious what they were and should have been names so labels could be redone. But othes could have been a couple of different ones and not being 100% sure we couldn't take the risk with so many brom growers expected here so we now have a lot of simply lovely broms marked down to a clearance price to get rid of them. Maybe i am paranoid but to me it looks like a gremlin has been here removing labels but why?????? I can't imagine why this could be. Perhaps the koalas or possums have a new trick up their sleeves.

Wendy

Ah Wendy, welcome to my world! lol They seem to just disappear, as if by magic.

hello all, back from my adventures. Wendy, I think your Guzmania could be G. 'White grapeade'? possible anyway. Love all the pics and good discussion going on. Karen, sorry to hear you're under the weather, but hopefully you'll improve and the weather will be a bit kinder to us all.
I went for a quick trip to NZ to see the Auckland bromeliad fiesta. they have some dream foliage Vrieseas there. The show was excellent and the people were really friendly and obliging, and if only I could have bought back plants! Lovely Vrieseas for $25, and alot were still there at lunchtime. Silly kiwis didn't know what they were looking at. Apparently they are more intereted in Neos.
This is One of the winning Vrieseas, V. 'Vista'
Sue

Sue, that Vista is beautiful. Wish we could get them from NZ. They have hybridized some magnificent epiphyllums too that we can't get hold of.

I am hoping to get to Wendy's on Saturday, but have had a rough week. May try to get there for a short visit and maybe even get a new brom :).

Karen

Oh yum, I think I need a vista! Sue, I hope you have plenty more pics for us?

Pam

My daughter and I went to the half price sale at Bromagic today.
The sales will be on for a while to reduce excess stock.
If you want plants now is a good time to visit.


I purchased six plants for $20.00.

Here is the pic.

Marlene, the broms are gorgeous. I am hoping to get to Wendy's tomorrow for their open day. Have been in much pain this week, so maybe drop in for a short visit.

Karen

Nice score amrlene, and thanks for the heads up. Karen, I hope you aren't to unwell. What have you done to yourself?
Wendy, good luck for tomorrow. I bet you wish jen was there to help. If I lived closer I'd be giving you a hand. I'm sure it will be very sucessfull.
More pics from accross the ditch.
V. 'Kandy Kandy'

V. 'Dusky Blush'. How nice is this one?

Neoregelia 'Tartan Princess'

This message was edited Mar 4, 2011 4:11 PM

Neoregelia 'Velox'

Neoregelia kautskyi in a really great container!

Karen...where is Wendys?

OOOOppppsss I see you mean "our Wendy"
Wendy where is your Open Garden?
Thanks

On the way to Wendy's this morning we passed another brom sale, and I picked up a couple of lovelies to add to my collection.

Wendy, sorry, I was wrong, this isn't Tim Ploughman. It is Quesnelia Marmorata Curly Top. A mother and 3 lovely pups.

Karen

Anyone know what this mini might be? not sure on its flower yet.

i love this one...

pimmento has 2 pups forming.

domino a mini

Sue, welcome home. I bet you are glad to get out of earthquake zone safely. love the photos. I have a tartan princess. I think it is one I got from Catlans. Speaking of Catlans, Genny Catlan released a new seedling yesterday at our open day. It is the pitcairnia seen here. I quickly grabbed 2 of them, one for me and one for Jen but I thought afterwards I should have grabbed a few extras for you guys.

Karen I love your quesnelia. It is probably like TP so don't take the first pup off until you have about 6 tubes in the pot just in case. Bring it over and Johnny will take the 6th pup off for you and show you how. If you want we can swap you for that 6th one. I'm sure we have plenty that you would like to swap for.

Marlene your newbies look lovely. Do you have names for them? The middle one looks nice. Is it perhaps Sunday picnic or sunday best? I'm probably way off but I like it anyhow. Sorry I didn't see your request for the address for our open day. But anytime you are down this way you will be welcome. We're at 746 Old Cleveland Rd East, Wellington Point. Just let me know when you are coming just in case we have a medical appointment. Lots of those coming up. We might just find a couple weeks to go away in between.

We had over 100 people sign in yesterday even though it did rain. Johnny had to mow the lawn in the rain on Friday so it was done. The BSQ people said we came so close to breaking the record for the most attendees at an open garden. Perhaps a bit of sunshine and we may have been right up there. We also came close to biggest takings. We probably would have beat the best in $ if we hadn't done so many back door deals with Catlens before the ladies got here. A couple of other early helpers also got a box of stuff put upstairs early too so we would have been right there. Perhaps if one of the other BSQ members hadn't back doored us by organising a sale the same day in our area we might have got more attendees too. Can't believe they did that. Talk about deliberate sabotage. Anyhow we had a busy day. I was in bed by 8pm last night and didn't wake up till about 7.45 this morning. Lucky today was very quiet in comparison. We cleared a lot of excess stock and made quite a bit of room. We had a lot of plants for $5. I couldnt' believe what Johnny had in there when showing them to people but it did work. Normally our clearance rack is $8 or 4 for $25 but today we did them for $5 or 6 for $25. Cleared a lot of them.
Wendy

That pitcairnia is certainly an interesting little creature, Wendy. Rather dramatic, isn't it?!

As for the 'locals' who took advantage of your open day by having a sale of their own, some people have an absolute hide. It's always nice to know who your real friends are..

Pam

Good morning fellow brom lovers.

Wendy, I am so pleased I got one of the pitcairnia babies. Something interesting to look forward to. And I would be so very happy to give you a pup from the Quesnelia. Lord knows, you've helped me so much with my modest collection. Don't forget, my list now has your Guz. Moonglow on it. I am not big on Guz. but that one I really like. So glad the sales went well.

Karen
Baby Pitcairnia Tabuliformis and Billbergia Rocky Road...

hi all. Lovely pics Bree. I'm not sure what your mini might be. It kinda reminds me of pepper, but there are so many I'm not familair with.
Congratulations on your open day Wendy. Glad to hear you did well despite a couple of set backs. Its funny how the 'space' aspect is more important than the income eh? I think we'd all keep our pups if we had enough room? The pitcairnia is lovely, and I especially like the leaf shape, like a cordyline.
Karen, you are soooo not addicted. he he. I love to see what bargain you get each week. Your block must be filing up well!
Hi Pam and Marlene.

Thought I'd show you some pics of broms at the Quarry gardens in Whangarei, NZ
Sue

more

Is it just me thinking Ebay is not as popular any more for bromeliads.
Last year I couldn't purchase a brom because I was outbid all the time.
Now only a few bids on bromeliads and if there is it's only one or two and it's won.

Is there an over supply of broms?
Maybe the money is not around because of the floods cyclones etc.

What is your opinion?

Marlene

those yellow ones on top of the stump in the first shot look interesting Sue. do you know what they are??

Karen I'm glad you got one of those pitcairnias. wish I had grabbed a few extras though. I wonder if there are any left. Might need a trip down to Catlans. Genny Catlan got a neo pink fairyfloss from me to use in hybridising. Lucky I had 3 of them but I am looking forward to seeing some beautiful stunning pink neos soon.

Marlene, I haven't even looked at eBay lately. Is it going "off"? Hey, my Oxypetallum is in flower, the one I got from Steve.

Wendy, I can't wait to see the new hybrids coming up. There are so many fantastically lovely broms about now and isn't it great we can never really "run out" of new ones thanks to the hybridizers.

Sue, I'm not addicted. Just caught up in the brom magic :).

Bree, I love your minis, and the one with the purple in it is great.

Karen

I still have some pics to show. I keep forgetting them. Must be old age!

Karen
Billbergia Hallelujah in flower. Hope I got that spelling right.

I had no idea NZ had such nice broms...
the punga logs make good totems for them.
Mind you Whangarei is a long way north of here - well away from the earthquakes too :)
my sister has a property even further north & is growing macadamia nuts & avocados (those in the tunnel house)
I'll have to introduce her to broms...

Hi marlene, I think broms are becoming more available at markets and people are finding alternative places to purchase them, such as nurseries and growers we mention here. There would be alot of people watching our forum and getting good leads from us! Broms are seasonal too, so maybe there are not as many pups to harvest at the moment. If you're anything like me, its hard to find something new and exciting on Ebay, as they begin to look much the same as something I already have. Personally, I enjoy meeting the growers and seeing the plants first hand, and the postage can be a bit exxy too.
Wendy, I think the yellow broms on the tree fern stump (Ponga log) are Aechmea recurvata, or a hybrid of. There seemed to be plenty of the little suckers in every full sun garden, and they cope with the milder sun and temps much better than here. It was amazing to see so many well grown broms in the various gardens I visited. Check out trademe.co.nz for what bromeliads are going for over there. You don't have to join to look.
Karen your spelling is spot on and so is your plant! Its just stunning. Its one of my favourites too, and very quick to clump, which is even more spectacular. every collection should have them.
Theresa, If they did survive in christchurch, they would have been shaken off the trunks! I was surprised to see so many in various places around the areas I travelled through (Auckland to Whangarei) and all the Neoregelias looked in good colour, so the climate really favours them. Maybe you could find a Neoregelia fireball (a small one that goes red in bright light) and try it in a sunny protected spot. (protected from snow, frost and cold winds) I know they are a little dearer to buy there, and am sorry I can't send you one to experiment with.
A couple more shots from the Quarry gardens in Whangarei