BROMELIADS IN SUMMER ..2014

Hi everyone. I hope everyone has enjoyed their Christmas as much as I have. Our garlic prawns were the biggest hit of all. Half an hour to prepare and two happy little boys. There were still some left over for Bianca and the boys to have with their tea. John doesn't eat any fish or shellfish. John and the boys have left now and I've tidied up and just taking it easy for now. He brought me up some pots full to overflowing of broms so I will have to deal with them soon. I also got a mini hot house which I think will be great for putting my foam boxes of pups in to root. Just have to find the right place to put it now. Nev so glad that you're back into repotting and that everything is fine with your hand. I wonder how Dianne is going? Lots of lovely pics but can't say I would like to find that carpet snake in my yard. Just looks like any other snake to me and I would be on top of the fence or anywhere else I could get off the ground. Ohhhh they do scare me. Well it has been absolutely superb weather here. I think that the warmest it got was 30C Christmas day. Must go and do some work. Hope everyone is well and I'll catch up again. Colleen

28C at 10am here today...
felt like summer :)
Took Sugar back for a nice cooling dip at the dog park. She comes out of the water refreshed & frisky & the walk through the rest of the dog park areas is enough to dry her off.

If I didn't know the water was highly likely to carry a massive amount of faecal coliforms I'd join her in the swim.
The water comes from many springs in the area but there are so many ducks and other water fowl upstream that the water might be crystal clear but it is not safe for humans to drink or swim.

The tomato & strawberry plants had a nice drink of seasol, forgot to splash some on Bil nutans but gave the pot a good spray with the hose until the water was running out of it - the pot is very free draining as well as hanging from a tree so I like to give it a good wetting a bit more often in summer.

Nev - your Neo Burgundy x Gold Fever is really nice, are you pleased with it?
I sure would be :)

Neo Razzberry Ripple has that look that reminds me of our science experiments with a line of black ball point ink on blotting paper close the the end sitting in a solvent.
The various pigments separate out & climb up the paper leaving horizontal stripes.

Colleen - garlic prawns sound yummy.
We did hot ham for lunch & hubby's older brother brought a salmon & couscous dish.

I put a chicken in the slow cooker at 9am & we had it for dinner at 7pm.
The meat was so tender it just fell off the bone - I tried putting baking paper in under neath it to give me a handle to lift the chicken out but that fell apart too.

Oh well, nobody minded that I 'carved' the chicken with a spoon :)

Hi Everyone!

Happy belated Merry Christmas to all my beautiful brom buddies, I hope everyone had a lovely day doing what they like doing most this time of year and for those travelling on the roads keep safe and well my friends during this busy time.

I had all good intentions to jump on and wish everyone a Merry Christmas before the day but then all the festive celebrations kicked off Christmas Eve (visiting friends), then Christmas and Boxing Day spent at home with our house full of friends who stayed over who left midday today. The rest of the day was spent resting (even snuck in a week nap) as we were both totally buggered including the girls and then we have Joe’s Birthday to celebrate tomorrow and more friends coming over for dinner. I said to Joe it’s getting harder to keep up now days because we live quieter lives than we used to when it comes to socialising a lot so this time of year really tuckers you out and something you don’t train for ha ha.

Nev so pleased to hear you are free at last with the pins removed and that you have been given the all clear to get back into the garden and play with your broms, that in itself would have been the best Christmas present ever for sure and great to read further below that you have started potting-up your brom pups which I know you really enjoy doing most of all as do I and cannot wait to get my hands on some to pot up.

Great to hear you had a fantastic Christmas with you family and sure having the grandkids around you to share the special day with would have been extra special watching them open their pressies and all the funny things they would for sure have gotten up to and made everyone laugh.

Nice to hear you got some nice steady rain over Christmas, we only got a little before Christmas but nothing more since.

Ha ha yes promise next time I wrestle a Python I will get Joe to take some pic’s, mind you he had ample opportunity given I wrestled the same Python three days in front of him and one day on my own as he had already left for work; he seems to help just at the very, very end after I have done all the wrestling and am about to throw it back into the wetlands; then he says something like “Well that’s great that we got it out of the yard and away from the girls”; that’s normally when I say “Yes thanks for all you help you were wonderful, I could not have done it without you (tongue in cheek) and we both throw our heads back and have a good chuckle together. The way I know if I can tackle the snake on my own is if I can grab its tail in my hand without it wrapping its tail around my fingers, if I can control it by its tail and not loose hold then I feel comfortable enough to pick it up and get it out of the yard; if the tails too strong then Joe steps in to help just to be safe.

I finally played catch-up reading all my emails and saw that massive Python pic you sent me and could tell straight away when looking at the pic what it had consumed. If I saw one that big in our yard I would have nightmares for the rest of my life and not something I would even attempt to wrestle or go near.

Thanks very much for the article you wrote on Bromeliad Potting Mixes, I found it thoroughly interesting to read and have printed a copy out in the hope to experiment a little with some of the combinations you wrote about, especially for seedling I liked the sounds of the mix and would not mind trying out to compare with what I use and see what grows better in what mix and will let you know as I have many little seedlings ready to be potted up individually so the perfect opportunity to try some out while I am off, I just need to make the time to do so and see how I go with the big clean-up I will be doing and I I have some spare time I will make up a mix to try.

Nev I will take pics of the Water Tractor this week, I keep forgetting with all the distractions around; it’s the best thing we ever brought for watering the garden as you can just set it on a timer and let it do its thing and we have noticed a big difference in the condition of our lawns as its getting to all those hard to get places that our irrigation usually misses.

I am spending the next 10 days cleaning up all my brom collection so I have a table set-up under our lemon tree in readiness and I am chomping at the bit to get out there and get started after all the celebrations are over.

Really liked the sound of the Sweet & Sour Chicken dish you made for Tea the other night, yes bugger that stuff that comes out of a jar with all those bad preservatives / additives; you cannot beat home made any day.

Lovely Neo. Pics you posted on 22/12, I especially liked Neo. ‘Black Forest’ with its dark colour, subtle spotting and great natural sheen and Neo. ‘Ashanti’ because purples my favourite colour.

I totally agree with what you said about Alan Freeman’s hybrids, that you have always been a fan; I too really like the hybrids he has produced and can’t get enough of those wide leaved hybrids and the amazing colours / markings they have. Great pics you attached taken by possibly Kevin.G as you say. I have a few in my collection but not as many as I would like but the one’s that I do have we could maybe one day look and doing some swaps if you like? Also the pics you shared with us from your Thai friend were very beautiful indeed grown to their full potential by the looks of all those beautiful layers, shape, size and colour.

Shirley hope you are finding time to play in the garden over the festive season, I’m still trying to sneak the opportunity but one more day and I’m there for sure.

Teresa like Sugar our Girls too have been cheeky over Christmas buttering all our friends up for special treats and attention, but they have well and truly kept our friends kids entertained as well as a couple of my friends cattle dogs Miley and Bonnie who had a sleep over last night, swum in the pool and went to the beach together; they were all totally exhausted by the end of it all (check out below Pic 3) and all the girls have done today is sleep in the air-conditioning on surrounded by their blankets and pillow LOL.

Colleen great to hear you had a lovely Christmas, you had my moth watering about the Garlic Prawns – YUM I don’t mind a good feed of them or any prawns in general. I made Peking Duck rolls as an entrée and Joe cooked a Turducken which was yummy and Cherry Pudding with Custard for desert.

Anyway time to put the kettle on and I have the munchies, not too sure how possible with all the food we have consumed these past couple of days LOL.

Hi to Jean, Brian, Diane and anyone else looking in; hope everyone is well and finding some time to spend in the garden.

Busy day tomorrow for Joe's B'Day so you may not hear from me until after 28/12.

Take Care & Happy Gardening!

Pic 1 - View of our walk on the beach each morning
Pic 2 - Joe's Orchid - Phrag. 'Olaf Gras' x 'Sargentian'
Pic 3 - Girls crashed out on their side of the couch
Pic 4 & 5 - Sorry old pics but promise to take new ones these holidays to share with everyone

Hi all,

Hope it has been a nice Christmas break for everybody. We spent the morning at our daughter's house opening a thousand presents for the grandson, then had all the family over for a late lunch. I think we will have to have another lunch here today as there is a stack of food left over. We are eating ham for breakfast, lunch and tea (Nev, you are right I had to think whether I call it dinner or tea)
Everybody had a good day except one, who had to travel back to Qld with a bad case of gout, looks like a painful affair.

It's a grey day here today, looks like we will get some rain. I was hoping to do some painting but might have to put it off for a day or two.

Teresa, we did the same with the slow cooker, chicken came out beautiful. We seem to be using it a lot recently for all sorts of meals, a great way of cooking.

Nev, good to see you are free of the pins in your finger and back out amongst it.

Trish, your Peking Duck rolls sound nice.

Anyway, better go and cook some ham on the BBQ before it rains.

Hi to everybody else.

Pic1 ....Not spelt correctly on label, closest i can see is hoehneana x fireball ?
2..........Neo. groucho
3..........Not sure, very small plant.
4..........Not sure
5..........Christmas present from Grandson.

Hi everyone – I’m a bit late today (Sunday) as I slept in this morning and then had breakfast and started re-potting which I’ve been doing all day. I set myself a target as I usually do, but this time I reached it and everything I had out to re-pot by 5.00pm has been done and watered and now it’s 4.47pm and I just remembered I haven’t checked DG today.

A big good day to anyone unable to post for various reasons and has anyone heard how Dianne is and how her arm is healing. Hi Dianne if you’re looking in, drop us a line and tell us how you’re getting on.

Colleen – Your talk of the garlic prawns has me drooling even though I’m allergic to them and can’t let them touch me. Boys being boys though, I thought your two would have eaten them all instead of leaving some for Bianca and the boys. (By the way, who is Bianca and the boys, more relatives or just family friends?)

I’m sure you’ll find lots of uses for your mini hot house, they’re very popular up here now also, and a lot of my friends grow their small seedlings in them as well as any difficult to strike cuttings of plants. Just don’t do what one of my friends did and put it where it can get the full summer sun on it; he cooked everything!

We’ve had great weather here also, nice sunny days in the mid to high twenties with a little overnight rain; very different to the heatwave conditions two years ago.

Teresa – What you call a dog park sounds more like a “holiday resort for dogs”. It must be wonderful to have such a park to exercise your dog. There’s lots of trouble going on here at the moment with dog owners having to leash their dogs wherever they walk them and even the two or three beaches that were leash free at certain times of the day are now having more restrictions placed upon them even though they aren’t patrolled or used for swimming. I’m sure all of these regulations are made up by council employees who hate dogs and don’t realize they have to be able to exercise freely somewhere……wankers!

Burgundy x Gold Fever was a last minute decision to make and although I only had a few seeds germinate, the one I posted is the pick of them. The shape isn’t too bad I guess, but I was disappointed there wasn’t more spotting like the Gold Fever parent, but I’ll reserve judgment until I get the first pup to maturity as they are usually better than the original seedling.

I must get more details from you about that science experiment you mentioned as I’m sure my grandsons would find it fascinating, as would I. I missed out on a lot of this good stuff in high school as they made me do bloody French instead of science, we had to take what we were given in those days without a choice so they could equalise the class numbers.

It wasn’t until Dad kicked up a fuss with the Head Master and told him that French and Ancient History wouldn’t help me to build houses and as my ambition was to be a carpenter, he asked if things couldn’t be changed around. Fortunately the Head Master was able to make decisions for himself without the aid of “procedures” such as everyone is controlled by today and it was because of this that I was allowed to do woodwork and tech drawing instead of Ancient History and French…….. When I left school I did do my apprenticeship as a carpenter, but after a few more years in a very “shaky” building industry, I opted for industrial ambulance work instead, and stayed at that until I retired.

While we’re talking about garlic prawns, your chicken in the slow cooker sounds pretty good also, even if you did carve it up with a spoon.

I’ll have to have a break here as my finger’s starting to ache a bit as I probably overdid things a bit today, with all the re-potting so I’ll finish this off in the morning if I don’t sleep in again.

Hi again – Here we are Monday again, another beautiful fine new day. My fingers are a bit stiff this morning after all the re-potting yesterday and I had to do my morning exercises under warm water earlier than I usually do to get things loosened up again but the fingers are working OK now so I’d better finish this post and have breakfast, as I can’t wait to get back out and into more re-potting.

Joe – HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU; HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU; HAPPY BIRTHDAY “ORCHID JOE”, HAPPY BIRTTHDAY TO YOU.

Trish – I’m pleased you had a nice Christmas with all of your friends albeit a very busy one and today you have Joe’s birthday to celebrate, so Happy Birthday Joe; I hope you get a nice Paph. for a present.

Yes, it’s great to be able to get back into the re-potting again, and at last I can see a bit of headway in what I’ve done, I’ll take a pic today to bring you all up to date with the project. Although I enjoy re-potting, and I could happily do it all day every day, it’s all spoilt by knowing I have to find somewhere to put all these plants and I’ve just about run out of room.

I look very much forward to seeing “Trish, the Lady Python Wrestler” when it is released, hopefully sometime soon. As you say the python in the pic I sent was a big one and I’ll bet you wouldn’t be too keen to wrestle it.

As for the article I sent on potting mixes; although it’s great and educational to try and experiment with different mixes, just remember that all of the mixes in that article were made up with our local conditions in mind and may not suit your warmer climate. The thing is, I’ve found brom’s will grow in practically anything as long as it’s well drained, watered occasionally and has plenty of good air circulation.

I’m looking forward to pic’s of the Water Tractor as I have a heap of Bunnings Vouchers which I got for Christmas and they’re burning a hole in my pocket.

I like Neo ‘Black Forest’ also; even though it’s nothing special, I find the dark colour does help to break up and give a lift to the other colours which can become a bit monotonous after a while. As for Neo.’Ashanti’, well I have two of them and both are different, which gets back to what Derek Butcher of ’Uncle Derek’ fame says; “NEVER TRUST THE NAME ON A NAME TAG”. I know I got one from Sue but I don’t remember where the other one came from; I know it would have been a swap but unfortunately I didn’t write the name of who I got it from on the back of the tag as I usually do, so it still remains a mystery.

I love the picture of your little girls below, it looks like they are living in a holiday resort just like Teresa’s “Sugar”. There’s something very special about seeing pets who are properly cared for and says a hell of a lot about their owners; some in fact are more than pets, they are more like the family’s children.

I know your "Peking Duck" is good, but I’m not too sure about Joe’s “Turducken” as it sounds too much like another language meaning it's made from “Duck Turd”, so in my opinion, a bit chancy; but the Cherry Pudding with Custard sounds pretty choice.

Trish I think your "New Years Resolution" should be to post all pic's the right way around as they're wearing out this old blokes neck. Just the same the first one definitely illustrates what it's like to be living in paradise; certainly something nice to look forward to each day.

That's a beautifully coloured Phrag. of Joe's in the second picture; I don't know that I've ever seen one with that unusual colour combination before, certainly good for the eyes, and the girls in Pic.3; what can I say that hasn't been said about them before except SPOILT, SPOILT, SPOILT, but also very much loved.

Don't apologise for old pic's, because it's great to be able to revisit pic's we've seen before and we always seem to see something we don't remember seeing previously for example, in Pic.5, what is the white leaved Neoregelia with green margins in front of the two Vrieseas in the middle of the picture?

Brian - Pleased to see you survived Christmas OK but I feel sorry for your friend with gout. It can be terribly painful and I remember our next door neighbour once telling me he had it in his big toes and it was so painful he couldn't even stand the weight of a sheet on it in bed of a night. It was once believed to be caused by drinking too much alcohol but it seems that's a fallacy.

Gout is a actually a form of arthritis associated with high blood levels of a compound called uric acid, which is a normal by-product of the breakdown of food in the body. In particular, uric acid is generated by the metabolism of compounds called purines, which are present in organ meats (e.g. liver and kidneys), seafood (especially anchovies), and some vegetables e.g. asparagus and mushrooms and is also believed to be aggravated by the acid in raw tomatoes.

Painting, painting, painting; what a terrible thought to bugger up a nice Christmas break. My house just about needs re-painting also and now and because I can't climb a ladder anymore I have to pay a painter to do it. The hardest part is convincing them to use oil based paints as they believe that acrylic paints are superior in every way. The thing is, if you have a weather board home, oil based paints are what you should use, as the linseed oil in the paint soaks in and helps preserve the timber whereas acrylic paints stay on the surface and are just "colouring". Unfortunately all people think of is the ease by which acrylic can be applied and not it's lack of preservation properties. The manufactures guarantee it for ten years which is good, but my house was painted eighteen years ago and is just about due to be done again, with another oil based paint as before.

Brian I think the name of the plant in your first pic is correct Neo. hoehneana x Fireball; I know "hoehneana" sounds unusual, but it is a Neo species and as your plant appears to be a miniature, it makes sense as Neo.'Fireball' is a miniature as well.

Neo. Groucho is one of the smaller hybrids bred by Chester Skotak from (carolinae variegated x Hannibal Lector) x Tiger Cub (a miniature) and registered in 2005. It has similar colours to the 21 other registered hybrids using (carolinae variegated x Hannibal Lector) as one of the parents.

The plant in your third picture looks like the species Neoregelia ampullacea which is one of the "true miniatures'. Pic.4 I'm not sure about, but could be a young Neo Gespacho which can be quite variable and often looks nothing like the picture on the BCR.

Your Pic 5 is great to see, and it seems that schools and pre-schools are very much encouraging the artistic talents of their young pupils. My older grandsons (4 and 6) are now bringing me pictures as well and even though I'm not a fan of modern art, its worth encouraging when you think of "Blue Poles".

If you don't remember,this was purchased by the National Gallery of Australia in 1973 for A$1.3 million and is now valued at much, much more. Interestingly, the gallery's director at the time, James Mollison, was not able to authorise purchases over $1 million, so the acquisition was approved by Prime Minister Gough Whitlam which caused an uproar from the general public at the time because he was said to be squandering public money. So let's hope that sometime during their lifetime, one of our grandkids can turn out something as good as this which is increasing in value all the time .

Sorry for getting off the track on so many occasions this morning but back on again (almost) with four out of five pic's to finish with. Pic No.4 was "off the track again" and was from my eldest grandson (6) done with an old tennis ball...... Now why didn't I think of that?

Pic.1 is a nice fully mature Neo. 'Rain Cloud' in flower, Pic.2 ,3 and 4 are three more of Peter Coyle's wonderful new Vriesea hybrids and Pic.4 may not be 'Blue Poles' but I still love my grandson's masterpiece.

All the best, Nev.

Nev - your Grandson's painting is worth framing...

Hello Everyone. I'm just back from shopping over in Hamilton.
From a very warm day yesterday we went to pouring rain this morning. Luckily it wasnt too cold, just windy. The rain has gone now but still overcast so maybe a bit more around. The gardens will be loving it as its been very dry here.
I took the time while the rain stopped to check on the apricot tree I have in my back area. Its is loaded with apricots and I have been managing to eat 2 or 3 each day.
A bit more warm weather will ripen them quickly.
I will alert the other residents so they can come and help themselves. It seems that each year the tree has been depleted by other people not living here. Probably because these 2 end units were unoccupied , so none to watch over the tree.
The birds have been enjoying all the top fruit which is okay because the tree is so tall and noone would reach those at the top.

I had a nice surprise yesterday while watering the broms.
I have aech La Tigra in a basket and it has flowered.
The plant is very pretty anyway, but the lovely bright flower stem is one I have not seen before.
Its funny that the plant put out a pup earlier this year , way before flowering.
I have some lovely color on all the broms as the sun gets warmer.
I think I did a great pic of the ones I thought would do well here.
I find there are 2 pups on about 5 of the neos. Bill Morris has 2 quite large ones. Looks like I will be potting a few pups up soon.
Nowhere as many as you Nev...lol

Lovely to see all the posts with so many pics.
I finally have a few new pics , but have gone back to using my big camera until I find someone who can show me whats wrong with the new small one.

I had a very quiet time over Christmas after going out to the cemetary to chat to my Robert.

I hope everyone had a great Christmas and I wish you all a very happy and safe New Year.

Time I went and did a few things domestic..

pic 1...my aech La Tigra.

pic 2 & 3... updated pics of vr Grafton Sunset & Angela.

pic 4 the very large apricot tree in my back area.

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE

Jean.

Hi everyone – Well yesterday wasn’t as productive as I thought it would be as I spent most of the day trying to find spots for all of the pups I re-potted and it seems now that any more I do will make me start the culling process. Any that don’t come up to scratch will have to go in the green bins to make way for the better ones. I suppose it was inevitable this would happen but I didn’t think it would be so soon.

Teresa – I’m glad you like the painting; I’m the first to admit I have no artistic ability but there was something that attracted me to it from the word go, and it certainly will get framed.

Jean – It’s good to hear you got some much needed rain; doesn’t it pep up the garden and all the brom’s? Like I’ve always said, “I wish I could bottle what’s in the rain, I reckon I’d make a fortune”.

It must be great having a tree loaded with apricots, we’ve been having to buy them here and like everything else over Christmas, the prices are inflated. Have you thought about drying some for future use? I think it was in Bunnings where I saw a small stainless steel fruit drying oven and it wasn’t all that expensive either. My son was talking about getting one to dry his tomatoes in as they all seem to come ripe together.

Flowering Ae. La Tigra was a nice surprise for you, it’s one I don’t have but I do know it’s thought to be a hybrid of Ae nudicaulis, and like a lot of the nudicaulis, the better light you give it the nicer the foliage colour will be. I see you have yours hanging, so the light must be right as the colour is nice. Like you say, the warmer weather is certainly bringing out the colours in the Neo’s and there seems to be something different to see each day.

It’s nice you were able to sit with Robert and remember the good times and also good you’ve been able to settle into the new home so well and I think what you’ve done with the garden in such a short time is amazing.

You say you had a quiet Christmas, however we had a very noisy one, but then that’s to be expected with three grandsons under seven. The thing is, they never stopped all day, and I must say I was pretty well exhausted when we went home just from watching them.

Well it looks like it's time to go again and to finish I'll just show a few pic's of some of my recent re-potting. The first two pic's are of the two rows of plants I re-potted on Sunday and the last three are of seedlings which I think could have some potential and will be grown on under better and less crowded conditions than they have been.

All the best, Nev.

Love the striped broms there Jean.

Apricots look good - I have a massive crop of Damson plums but the birds tend to get most of them.

My old dog would have stripped the lower branches by now - Sugar isn't interested.

Be interesting to see if she goes after the ripe plums in a few weeks.

Nev - we were posting at the same time...

wow that's a lot of work you got through with the repotting!

The 3 seedlings you have singled out are very nice, be interesting to see what they develop into - and what the next generation shows.

Hi everyone. Nev it is so great to see and hear about your repotting. He's a happy-chappy me thinks.Bianca is John's partner and the boys are Cameren and Branden. The boys haven't stopped phoning me since they went for a holiday with John on Saturday. I think they think that I'm going to run away while they're not here. They've been shopping and been to the duck pond. I expect they might be fishing today if the weather permits. Beautiful here but I don't know what it's doing down there. When I first went to high school they put me in the secretarial class. I hated it then they put me in the sewing class and I was more at home there. When I first left school I had an office job but I couldn't stand it so I left and got a job in the packing shed packing dried fruit and citrus. I'm a hands on person and nothing more boring for me than to sit all day. I worked at the packing shed until my first baby was coming and then after that I always picked grapes every year while my Mum looked after the babies. By the time I last picked grapes my back was starting to wear and after picking all day and then sitting in the car to come home it used to take about 10-15minutes to feel anything in my legs. Once I could feel them again I wander straight in for a shower and then I was like brand new. The things we used to do to earn a quid. You should have seen me yesterday. Friends of ours have gone away and Branden was going to feed their 2 rabbits while they were gone. Well guess who is doing it instead. yes, muggins me. I went to their place and lifted up the top of the hutch like I've seen it done a million times, went to the garden to get their greens and fill their water and their grains and I saw something move in the garden. Yeah, you guessed 1 little brown rabbit and 1 little white and black rabbit hopping around without a care in the world. Then I had to get them back in. Well the white one went in quite easily but the brown one took me two hours. Needless to say I didn't lift the top up very far today and every time I put something in there I quickly closed it. The brown one looked like he was laughing at me and just waiting for me to slip=up. I just had 3 phone calls all from the same number, Cameren's. I let the calls ring out because I told them if I didn't answer to leave a message and I'd get back. They probably want to tell me that they're going to have squid for tea. Had better go and see what's up. Keep well everyone. Colleen

funny thing Colleen - I wanted to do typing & shorthand...
was enrolled in those classes & Mum was called in to the school with me & told I was far too clever for those classes & should take French.
I argued that I wanted practical skills & they countered with French being good for me when I got to Uni.

well I never did get to go to University but office skills would have been very useful.

Hi everyone – Here it is about 3.00 pm Tuesday and I’ve just come in from outside as it’s 38C. with a hot westerly wind blowing which is making it quite hot and unpleasant.

I started out this morning with the good intentions of finding locations for all the plants I’ve potted up, but as usual my intentions once more got derailed. As I was moving a few plants around to make space I started pulling off a few dead leaves and ended up dead leafing almost two hundred plants.

I also went over to the seedling shade house to see what was developing there and tossed a couple of seedlings that didn’t look up to much, and from then on for the next half hour I found I was culling plants; something I should have done a long time ago. I thought, “now I’ve made a start I might as well do it properly“, and became quite ruthless. I’ve only done about a ten foot bench and already I’ve tossed about twenty large seedlings. They were only in three and four inch pots but already 15”-18” high and because they were top heavy they were all toppling over which consequently led to them growing crooked. The good news is however, I’ve found probably another dozen which are showing a bit of promise and what’s more they now have a bit of space in which to grow; the next thing however will be to re-pot them also, so they have a new lease of life.

As I was dead leafing this morning I also noticed some sort of climber growing through the top of some of the hanging pots in the corner of the shade house. On closer inspection I saw that it was coming in from next door and it was that dreaded “Moth Plant” or “Wild Choko” (One of the nine different Araujia species); I wasn’t very happy to say the least as I’ve not long got rid of it from growing in from the neighbor’s place on the other side and when I looked over the fence I could see it growing rampant all over my neighbor’s disused veggie garden and up through his orange trees.

I know it’s poisonous and classed as a banned and noxious weed and if it’s allowed to seed, it comes up all over the place, so fortunately I’ve found it before it’s fruit is ripe so my son’s coming over tomorrow to help clear it off the roof. My neighbours are a very nice couple and very friendly, but unfortunately know bloody nothing about gardening or weeds so I have to keep a watch on three yards instead on just one. If you don’t know what I’m talking about with this plant, read all about it at: http://keyserver.lucidcentral.org/weeds/data/03030800-0b07-490a-8d04-0605030c0f01/media/Html/Araujia_sericifera.htm

Teresa – Gee we were posting at the same time. I’ve noticed members posting very close together before but never exactly at the same time (12.53pm) I wonder what the odds are for that happening.

Unfortunately I don’t have any fruit trees but I can relate to your old dog eating the plums. My daughter once had a young staffy called “Max” and unbeknown to us he developed a taste for strawberries. After I had wrongly accused everyone in the family of pinching my strawberries, one afternoon my wife called me and said, “Have a look down the yard”; what I saw was Max right in the middle of the strawberries keeping a close watch on the house as he ate them.

It didn’t end there though; as Max got older he also developed a taste for cherry tomatoes which I found out by looking at his droppings one morning. I had always made a point of looking at our dogs droppings before burying them as my vet had once pointed out to me that you can often identify medical problems before they get too serious by looking at an animal’s droppings.

Obviously, you can see if they have been ingesting anything foreign such as eggs. (I knew about this one already as we had a dog that ate eggs when I was a boy) and we found him out by noticing bits of egg shells in his droppings. Also if the stools are black in colour, this can indicate blood somewhere in the upper bowel or stomach, (the reason for the stool being black is due to the action of the stomach acid on the blood as it passed through.

If there is bright red blood, it could indicate bleeding from the lower part of the bowel, or if the motions were loose and watery, it could indicate some sort of a bowel bug, also if they appeared to be surrounded by a slimy type of coating, this indicated some other problem, but I don’t remember exactly what this was. (Obviously if you were to examine the faeces under a microscope and knew exactly what you were looking for you could identify many other problems early also, but that’s getting into vet territory).

Anyway this particular day on my “pooper scooper rounds” I noticed these red things in Max’s droppings and on closer inspection, I found they looked like small pieces of tomato skins, and sure enough, once we started keeping an eye on him, we caught him eating a few cherry tomatoes every time he walked past the bush.

Gee there I go, side-tracked once again. I’ll try and get back on track again and talk some more about brom’s tomorrow morning.

Colleen - Well it's Wednesday morning now and what a difference; 26C. and fine rain. It's nice to get rid of the unexpected heat from yesterday but it's going to muck up my brom plans for today though.

It's good to hear that the boys are enjoying themselves on holiday with uncle John, you should be happy that you're still firmly in their minds and they're phoning to make sure you're OK. I'll bet that if you said you weren't well, they'd be onto uncle John to bring them home again to look after you as I'm sure they very much appreciate everything you do for them even though at that age it's not "cool" to put their feelings into words.

I remember as a kid when Mum and some of the other Mum's where we lived at Dunmore would go pea picking to make a few extra shillings. The farm where they picked them was adjacent to the blue metal quarry and every so often when they would be blasting out blue metal (Basalt) at the quarry, we would have to duck down behind a couple of big boulders as protection from the smaller bits of flying rocks. One of the Mum's sons worked as a shot firer at the quarry and he always sounded the warning siren much longer than normal to give us plenty of warning to take cover. Obviously that was in the good old days before Work Cover N.S.W. and Worksafe Australia.

The rabbit story reminds me of "Buggs" who was my wife's pet rabbit when she was a kid. Buggs was always eating; grass, carrots, bread, veggies, anything at all; you name it and Buggs ate it. Consequently, he just seemed to be getting fatter and fatter every time we looked at him and then one morning there were five rabbit kittens in his hutch with "him?". It was then they realised Buggs wasn't a bloke at all. He was never out of his run so one of the wild rabbits must have done his dreadful deed through the wire netting of the cage, and as they say, "love will always find a way".

Teresa - It seems we've all strayed of the brom topic today, and reading what happened to you at school was similar to myself, with the same subject as the culprit "French".

We still seem to be missing a few of the regulars who no doubt are busy getting ready for the big New Year celebrations, so I'll wish you all a Happy New Year in advance.

At least I'll finish today with something brom. related; Neo. Images taken from the web. No matter what Dave's Garden says in the copyright recognition at the top of these pictures, none of these plants or the pictures are mine. I got them off the web and there was no Copyright or photographer's name to give credit to, so hopefully I won't end the year being in trouble over copyright infringements.

First I'll start with one of Chester Skotak's newer hybrids which is most unusual as it's a combination of brilliant colour and well as being variegated it's spotted at the same time. No parents names were given and it hasn't been registered as yet so I can't provide a name, but it's very easy on the eyes. The second one (Pic.2) is the beautiful Neo. 'Golden Idol' which was bred from Neo.'Hal Ellis' x cruenta 'French form' by Sharon Petersen and registered in 1994. This picture illustrates just what you can achieve when growing these beauties beneath good light. Pic.3 is another new one from Chester Skotak and is a beautiful spotted type in a nice unusual subtle colour combination, certainly something very different . Pic.4 is Neo. 'Queen Kapulani'; this is an unregistered name so I can't provide any other information about it, but if anyone here can shed some light about it's history, please feel free to do so. I'll finish off with one that quite a few of us have in our collections. It's mini Neo. 'Shamrock', and although it's been around since 1988, it's not very often you see one flowered as well as this example.

All the best, Nev.

Hi all,

A bit of an overcast new year's eve here today.

A bit of work to do as well, a quick brush over and paint of a slat type fence has turned into a major task as the old stain / paint came off like burnt skin does. Have to remove it all and start again.

Jean, your Ae. La Tigra plant looks nice and healthy as does the apricot tree in your pics. A few fruit trees would be a good thing to try and grow, do they need much attention?

Teresa, I never understood the importance to learn languages over a practical skills subject that the majority would actually use. Thankfully the choices now are more aimed at what the student needs to learn.

Colleen, some fishing is something I haven't done for a while, might find somewhere to throw a line in later in the day.

Nev, like yourself i was given a few Bunnings vouchers at Christmas so I went and bought a composting worm farm as my neighbour has one and likes it. I will see how it goes. The colours in your Grandson's painting catch the eye, priceless.

I have a couple of Vrieseas with some white substance on them (pictured). Would anyone know what it is?

Hope everybody has a nice new year's eve and good luck for the coming year.

Brian

Hi Everyone!

The New Year is just around the corner so I did not want the day to pass without saying a BIG HAPPY NEW YEAR to all my WONDERFUL BROM BUDDIES!!!

Brian great to hear you had a lovely time at your daughters place opening presents with your grandson, sure that would have been enjoyable to see the look upon his face. What a cute Christmas present from you grandson, looks like you have an artist in the family,

Hope you got some rain too when it looked like it was going to; we really need it here and pretty much all of today was overcast with rain clouds coming close to us as well as storms but looks like it missed us again as we only got a couple of drops here and there and then it was all gone.

My Peking Duck Rolls are a real hit whenever I make them and I seem to be making it a lot of late due to popular demand amongst my friends and family who can’t get enough of them he he.

Lovely brom pictures you posted, looks like Nev has kindly identified the one’s you were not sure about so that’s great to see.

Have fun with the worm farm, we want to get one down the track to make work tea for our herb garden.

Brian the white substance on your Vriesea’s I believe is fungal matter and can be treated with a fungal treatment such as Mancazeb which is safe to use on all bromeliads, just follow directions carefully and wear gloves when using. The white spots on your second pic appear to be scale and again you can treat your broms for this too with different pesticides for sale out there, I mainly use Confidor for severe cases of black and white scale. Look at possibly increasing the airflow around your Vriesea’s for the fungal once you have treated your broms and space them out a little more to help if you have them all close together so the fungus does not spread as easily spread by brom leaves rubbing or carried by wind onto other surrounding plants and it spreads from there.

Nev pleased to hear you are Kicking Butt in the re-potting department. I too have been cleaning broms and repotting them these past couple of days and have only really made a small dint out of my entire collection but at least it’s a good start and in the process it’s giving me time to totally unwind in the garden and get a bit of fresh air etc. I am only about a quarter of the way working through my collection and am gob smacked at how many pups I am discovering on all the broms, way many than I had expected so I am potting up what I can and getting some ready for the next market I will be holding later next year in 2015.

I have not heard from Dianne and hope she’s well and that her arm is healing well.

Thanks for the Happy Birthday wishes to Joe, he had a lovely day celebrated at home with close friends and me and he did bring one of his favourite Phap. ‘Saint Swithen’ Orchids in to display and show everyone the seven stunning flowers that had recently opened.

Attached are some pics of the Scrub Python I recently wrestled to share with everyone; not that big only approximately two years old with a lot more growing to do yet.

I have also attached pictures Joe took of the Water Tractor (finally) and the little black ramp you place at the end where you want the tractor to stop where the water will cut off as soon as it reaches the ramp.

Pleased to hear you liked the picture of the girls crashed out on our couch after too much partying he he. They are like our children and our lives would not be the same without them as they bring to us much joy and unconditional luv and we can’t help but spoil the little buggers rotten because they don’t ask for much and bring us so much joy.

HA HA the next time Joe cooks a Turducken (Turkey, Duck, Chicken) all rolled into one I will say “Thanks for cooking the Duck Turd honey it tastes fantastic” and see what reaction I get LOL.

Let me see what I can do with these pictures off my phone that save wrong as I am sure the recent one’s Joe just uploaded for me today will do the same thing possibly so let’s see how I go?

Pleased to hear you liked the picture of Joe’s Phrag’ orchid, isn’t it a pretty colour, it’s one of his favourites as each year he takes pics of it and the blooms and growths are improving every year so it is very impressive when it does flower and the flower spike is very tall.

I think the Neo. with green margins you asked about in Pic 5 from 27/12 is I believe ‘Gray Nurse’ with only a slight hint of colour at the moment. I remember the last time I posted a close up picture of this one in colour some time ago some people on this forum thought it did not look like ‘Gray Nurse’ but could not identify it for me.

Lovely pictures you posted of Neo. ‘Rain Cloud’ such a gritty colour and all of those lovely Vrieseas of Peter Coyle’s new hybrids – thanks for sharing with all of us. Your Grandson’s Masterpiece is my favourite of all and well worth hanging on your wall for sure with all that amazing happy colour and how great that you admire it so much that you have hang it up to enjoy every day.

Great pictures of your recently potted broms showing wonderful colour as well as the one’s you say could have some potential, they sure look like they will grow up to be stunners with all that great shape and colour.

Jean pleased to hear you get some nice rain, your broms will luv it as well as all the other beautiful plants you have growing. Yum I luv apricots and how great that you have your own tree in your back yard; are you going to make any jam or would you prefer just eating them fresh every day; fresh is best but at least if there is too much fruit you can preserve some to enjoy later.

Lovely pics you posted of Ae. ‘La Tigra’ in flower, aren’t the flowers stunning and you are so right even when the plant is not in flower the plant’s stunning. And your Vriesea’s in flower look stunning as well as how beautiful and large does that apricot tree look very healthy looking indeed.

Nice to hear you visited Robert over Christmas and hope the little flowers you liked so much were all out in full bloom on the hill for you to enjoy.

Ha ha Colleen it’s not Easter yet what are you doing chasing rabbits around the yard for 2 hours, quick little buggers they are aren’t they but so cute never the ness.

Great to hear the boys are having fun, wait till you tell them the rabbit story sure they will have a great chuckle at your expense LOL.

Time to attach some pics…let’s see what I can find.

HAPPY NEW YEAR MY BEAUTIFUL BROM BUDDIES and I look forward to speaking with you all in 2015!!!

Take Care & Happy Gardening!

Trish

I think my pics from my phone do not attach properly because not compatible with DG program possibly as I save them right but it appears to make no difference except pic 2 came out ok this time so now I am totally confused. No matter what I try it's an issue uploading these pics to DG?

Pic 1 - Scrub Python I wrestled
Pic 2 - Girls with wind in their hair
Pic 3 & 4 - Water Tractor for Nev
Pic 5 - Neo. NOID - adore this one

Hi everyone and Happy New Year. The boys will be home tomorrow, my peace will be shattered. No not really. I have missed them terribly. They are having a BBQ with John, Bianca and some friends that have kids that they know so it should be good for them. John has told them that they are allowed to stay up and see the New Year in, but I've told them not to ring me as I'll probably be in bed. If I'm not I will ring them. Warming up again and we're supposed to get some really hot weather for the start of the New Year. Micheal came and had lunch with me today. He's got a 4 day weekend off now. They're busy getting their house ready to rent out when they move into their new one. I haven't seen it yet so will be lovely when I do. The kids are all happy to be having a room of their own soon. They may not like it when they have to keep it clean and can't blame anyone else for the mess. I saw Dianne over in the tea room so she's okay. Well everyone. See the old year out gracefully and welcome the New Year with excitement and wonder. Thank you for all being my friends and it's been a great year spent with you all. Colleen

Hi all,

Wishing everyone a Happy New Year and all the very best for 2015

Shirley

Hi everyone – Well here we are at the start of another new year and may I wish you all lots of health, wealth and happiness for the next twelve months. Let’s hope all of the worlds leaders can sort out their differences and bring an end to all the conflicts and unrest and let everyone settle down to a peaceful existence.... I know it will probably never happen, but that’s my new years wish anyway.

It's great to look at D.G. this morning and see lots to read, so I'll have to do my post in two parts today as I still have heaps to do with my brom's and want to make the most of such a beautiful sunny day.

Brian: Your painting job has turned out like any other painting job and what you thought needed doing was just the tip of the iceberg. I think one of the paint companies (Walpamur I think) brought out these various fence paints in a few basic colours many years back now but what they didn’t tell us is that they were just a watered down version of external water based paints. Although they did what they claimed they would do, they were just a “quick fix” and once again they were a paint that just sat on the surface and didn’t soak into the timber. Consequently, once you painted the fence, it became an ongoing job and like other painting jobs, the longer you left it the more work involved, so good luck with the painting mate.

Not having any experience with fruit trees, I probably shouldn’t be getting involved in your question to Jean, but I’ll just mention there is also another option; this is growing some of the many smaller versions in a large pot. These were bred primarily for people in units and designed to fit on a small porch. They obviously don’t produce as much fruit as the standard size trees, but they do produce a lot for their size. They are reasonably cheap to buy, easy to manage and are just another option for anyone with limited space in their yard.

Fishing is just a very distant memory to me and the last time I went was to teach my two sons how to fish. Dad taught me how to fish for Blackfish which was his favourite hobby, both as a sport and food for the table; he said there was an old saying which said, “give a man a fish and you feed him for a day, teach him how to fish and you feed him all his life”. Those were the days when we used Green Weed for bait for Blackfish or caught Poddy Mullet for Flathead bait and pumped Nippers or caught Squirt Worms for Bream, Whiting and anything else that swam by and was hungry.

My son-in-law is a good fisherman and every time he goes he usually provides us with a nice feed of Flathead or Bream, however he is of the new breed and uses all of these new fangled plastic lures with just a few prawns occasionally. I’m afraid the fun’s gone out of fishing for me as the places we used to go you now almost have to pre-book a spot these days as there are just so many fishing our old spots. It is good to see bag limits introduced though, as well as the re-stocking of some of the estuaries down here with fingerlings as well as baby prawns and this will ensure there are still fish for future generations to catch.

I think you made a wise purchase with the Worm Farm, as in my opinion anything natural has to be a plus for the environment. A lady in our local Brom Society has several, and “Worm Wee” as she calls it, is all she feeds her brom’s with and they are growing very well. It’s an on-going by-product from the worms and she even sells bottles of it at the local markets and says she sells all she can provide.

The White substance in your first picture is in fact and insect called “Mealy Bug”, they can cause a lot of damage if let get out of control. They like a dry protected environment so as a deterrent, the first step is move your plant where it gets good air circulation; secondly, when watering always give that part of the plant an extra hit from the hose. With just a small colony such as you have there, it’s possible to just dab them a few times with Metholated Sprits on a small paint brush, if they persist, an immersion in Confidor or similar insecticide will do the trick. I prefer an immersion as you don’t have spray drift going where you don’t want it plus it also treats a secondary problem of “Root Mealy Bug” which is often present as well. See the site below for more info or “Google|” one of the many other sites available. http://www.ipm.ucdavis.edu/PMG/r280301011.html

The white substance on your second plant is one of the many types of scale insects (There are 8,000 described species worldwide) and these can be managed in a similar manner initially using Metholated Spirits for small areas. Although not as serious as Mealy Bug, they can still become a nuisance if allowed to breed into a colony. Scale is often found together with Mealy Bug (Third plant) and like Mealy Bug, they like the same dry environment (like inside the dead lower leaves of brom’s), that’s why you often hear of brom. Growers saying they have to “dead leaf” their plants. This just means the removal of the dead basal leaves. There is lots of good information on the internet, but the following site accurately explains all that’s required without getting too technical.
http://www.gardeningknowhow.com/plant-problems/pests/insects/control-plant-scale.htm

WHATEVER YOU DO, DON’T USE ANY OF THE PETROLEUM BASED PEST OILS CURRENTLY AVAILABLE. THESE WILL BLOCK UP THE STOMATA AND PREVENT THE PLANT FROM BREATHING. WHEN EVER USING ANY TYPE OF INSECTICIDE, METHOLATED SPIRITS OR SUITABLE OIL PRODUCTS, ALWAYS APPLY WITH THE PLANT IN THE SHADE.

For a safe alternative you could make up your own spray using Rob Smythe’s Canola Oil Spray recipe. As a qualified chemist and well respected brom grower and hybridiser, Rob delivered a very well received talk on this topic at the Cairn’s Bromeliad Conference a few years back and the recipe and explanation why we should use this spray can be found at: http://www.fcbs.org/articles/canola.htm

I’ll finish here this morning as it’s a nice day and I want to get stuck back into my brom work. I will however be back to finish my post this afternoon when I’ve run out of “puff”.

All the best, Nev.

Hi all,

Beautiful day here today. Hopefully, your heads aren't hurting too much.

Trish and Nev, thanks very much for all your detailed advice. The article on the canola spray is interesting, might give that a go in future. I will re-pot them and give them a spray.

Happy New Year to everybody else.

Brian

we saw the New Year in with my brother & his family & Hubby's brother Ken &their parents joined us there.
Shared a meal & had a very low key evening.

Today we all had lunch at hubby's brother's place.
Ken is the youngest of the boys & his fiancee Justine is from Singapore - she made sushi for lunch - very yummy.

Justine gave me some basil seedlings so those are now in the pot with my very tiny tomato seedlings - well watered in with Seasol.

While I was at it I gave Bil. nutans a drink of Seasol.

Sugar has been for her walk at the dog park, we have two shows tomorrow - only Dalmatian entered so I will win best of breed I should imagine...
She is looking out the window & growling at passers by & keeping a close eye on our neighbour who is busy replacing the fence between our properties.
I feel a bit guilty as he is doing all the work & wouldn't take any money from us as our part toward it.

take care all -
may 2015 be a happy year for everyone :)

cheers - Teresa

Hi Everyone!

Happy 2015!!! We just made it to midnight last night then crashed out very soon after a big day in the garden playing with my broms.

Just a quick drop in today so I wont' reply individually to everyone like I normally do.

Today other than our visit to the beach this morning was spent doing bookwork ALL DAY LONG, nearly all finished with only a little spread sheeting to do.

Tomorrow we will probably catch-up with friends and then the weekend we have a party to go to on Saturday night but will spend the weekend in the garden hopefully.

Anyway just a quick drop in as dinners nearly ready that Joe cooked tonight and it smells beautiful.

Take Care & Happy Gardening!

Trish

Hi everyone – Back again; it’s getting too hot to work outside this afternoon so I thought I’d have a break until things cool down a bit later on and in the meantime, pick up when I left off this morning.

Trish – Happy New Year to you and Joe too and I hope you don’t have a bad headache from all the mango wine you drank last night.

You say I identified Brian’s plants for him, just let me correct you a little and say I think I identified them. It's very hard to accurately identify a plant from a picture, especially bromeliads when they are continually going through colour changes.

You make a good point when you advised Brian to wear gloves when using various sprays. It’s good basic advice which I’ve always followed myself and yet I omitted to pass it on in what I wrote. Another thing that’s often overlooked is the directions; especially the safety directions and what to do if you accidently make contact with the particular substance. There are so many different toxic sprays on the market today it becomes quite confusing and you should always wear the recommended personal protective equipment. You may look like the “man on the moon” in some instances, but it is for your own protection.

Looks like I have to stop again as we’ve just had a carload of visitors pull up out the front, so it looks like I’ll have to leave this until the morning when everyone’s still in bed.

************************

Here it is, the morning of the 2nd Jan and I’m still trying to finish this post. I'm back again without any distractions and hopefully I’ll get it finished with this attempt.

Yesterday I had bit of a change and potted up some Bill. pups a friend had sent me before I injured my hand; since then they have been parked in a box with their bases just touching some damp Coco Peat. When I got them out yesterday I was surprised to see most of them had reasonable new root systems. I potted them up and when I finished I decided to also pot up some Bill. which I had been putting off for some time. They are seedlings from a cross of Hallelujah and Domingos Martins and are just starting to show a bit of colour. Today, it’s back to tidying up a bench in the Neo. shade house and then more Neo re-potting.

Thanks for the pictures of the python and your Water Tractor (What brand was it?) Also the girls enjoying their outing in the car.

I don’t know anything about mobile phone pictures, but you could download them to your computer and then rotate them by using the “Picture Manager” programme in Microsoft Office and then try posting them. I think it was Wendy who had problems trying to post directly from her phone as well when she used to post.

Thanks for identifying the Neo. ‘Grey Nurse’ for me, I should know by now that any nice variegated plants are usually hybrids from Chester Skotak, and it wouldn’t surprise me if the NOID in your picture is another one from the same breeder which someone has simply lost the name from.

Colleen – You say your peace will be shattered when the boys come home from their little holiday, but we all know you can’t wait to see them again and things around your home get back to normal.
I’m sure they’ve had a good time and enjoyed mixing with other kids but I think they will be more pleased to get back home with their Gran and the security of a loving home and their pets.

Pleased to hear that Dianne is OK, and when you speak to her again ask her to drop in and say gooday.

Shirley – Hi Shirley, and happy new year to you as well. As you haven’t been posting as often as you did previously I was wondering if everything’s OK; Is it just a case of being "time poor" during the silly season or have you been unwell and the back’s giving you problems again, if you have, take it easy and get better soon.

Teresa – Happy New Year to you and your family as well. Nice to hear you all had an enjoyable family celebration, we did as well, and as usual New Year’s Eve was very low key, just my wife and I. We’re getting too old to mix it with the young ones these days, and besides my old ears can’t tolerate what the play for music.

You should be quizzing Justine; as they grow some superb orchids and bromeliads in Singapore and who knows, she may just be an enthusiast as well.

It seem that Miss Sugar is in a “win win” position for the show tomorrow, as long as she doesn’t disgrace herself and take off after a cat or some other distraction. Ha! Ha!

Oh to have a neighbour like yours, I would just settle for ones that would keep their weeds in their own yard instead of sharing them with us.

Trish – Hi again, it seems that I’ve finally got to the end of this great Christmas/ New Year post and I seem to have gone the full circle as I started out with you and Joe and here you are back again.

It’s strange how you can look at things without actually seeing them; my Vriesea and Guzmania shade house is between our garage (where I do my re-potting) and the rest of the back-yard and other shade houses. Whenever I re-pot plants I always put them on the floor of this shade house for a couple of days as it’s cool and gives them a chance to recuperate.

I’m in and out of this area every day, and regularly pass through it from the garage to the rest of the yard, yet it was only in the last few days that I noticed just how many Vrieseas and Guzzies are coming into flower. I think when you are familiar with a certain area you don’t notice things as much as you do in other areas. Yesterday, I had a closer look and it suddenly dawned on me that I also have to lots of dead leafing to do on all of the plants in here also, as well as lots of dividing and more re-potting as well. It seems the work is never done, but the good part is that these plants don’t have spines on the leaves to contend with so it will be a nice change.

I’ll finish now with a few more pic’s as usual and hope you will all be recharging your batteries after all the annual celebrations in readiness to post once again tomorrow. The pic’s today show the Vriesea and Guzmania shade house and all of the work that awaits me here.

All the best, Nev.

Nev - Justine is becoming keen on plants & gardening but in Singapore I don't think she had time.

She is enjoying being able to grow her own herbs & vegies.

Sugar was a good girl all day today, it was hot one, they say 27C but I think at the show it was hotter as there was very little wind & while the grounds have lovely trees all around the perimeter only the eastern side had much shade - and our ring was pretty much north facing so sun blazing down on us.
We bought a cheap beach shelter & had that facing away from the sun with Sugar's crate inside.
It was a few degrees cooler but after the first show she decided it was nicer to hide in the shrubbery behind us...
not a silly idea as she had the benefit of any breeze and if there had been space for me I'd have joined her.
She gained the two challenges on offer so just needs one more to become a champion.
I was also thrilled to have Best Open of Group awarded to Sugar at the afternoon show.
She did run nicely, I think snooziing under the shrubbery gave her the advantage over the other hot dogs.

Hi everyone – It looks like another hot one here today; yesterday was so hot in the afternoon that I retreated into the garage for some more re-potting. It’s quite comfortable in there when it’s hot as I can open the tilt-a-door at the front and the double doors at the back and capture any air movement at all.

As well as this I have an old $12 Bunnings pedestal fan that my daughter was going to “chuck” just because the pedestal base was broken. I cut off the old base, bored a hole in my work bench and inserted the metal tube which supports the fan in the hole. I can now aim it directly where I sit at my potting bench.

Yesterday I found one of the bi-generic crosses I grew from seed and it is flowering; it’s no world beater, but in my opinion is better than xNiduregelia ‘Something Special’ which was its parent, so I’ll be keeping this along with a few other from the same cross.

Teresa – The way you spoke, for some reason I though Justine still lived in Singapore and was just here on holiday, that’s why I mentioned the beautiful brom’s and orchids grown in that country.

I remember Harry Luther who was a world expert on bromeliads before he died was the consultant for the bromeliad section of the world famous “Gardens by the Bay in Singapore”. I’ve never been there, but some of my friends have and they say it rates as another “Wonder of the World”.

If you want to get some idea of the enormity of the project, check out the 4,688 photos on the site below:
http://www.tripadvisor.com.au/ShowUserReviews-g294265-d2149128-r192197225-Gardens_By_The_Bay-Singapore.html#photos

Congratulations “Sugar”, who’s a clever dog then? I’ll bet she’s very pleased with herself. It’s interesting when you said about how she found a cooler spot in the shrubbery. I’ve learnt from experience that if you want to find the coolest place in your house or yard, just look at where the cat or dog is resting, as it seems like animals can source these prime spots better than we humans every time.

Below is another site which all dog lovers may be interested in; it’s really worth a look.
https://www.youtube.com/v/txiR7oEVGd0

Time to go and have some breakfast before another day with the brom’s and once again I’ll finish with a few pic’s of some brom’s. Today I decided to show some random unnamed pic’s I downloaded from the net; these are of a bromeliad genus called Dyckia. They certainly aren’t my favourites with all those prickles, but they do look attractive grown in a cacti garden, and certainly something a bit different.

All the best, Nev

Hi all,

Hope everyone had a very enjoyable start to 2015.

It is raining here again (make that teeming) so I am forced to come inside. It’s very hot and muggy even though the sun is hiding. Gives me a bit of time to check in with DG even though I should be dragging out the sewing machine and catching up with my chores around the house.

Nev, everything is fine here, still having some back issues but mostly just a case of ‘time poor’ as you suggested. Also Michael has been doing his family tree and has been spending hours on the computer researching and I have been trying to help where I can. I must also admit to some facebooking as well.

Love your pics of the dyckias, I have just purchased my first one, waiting for it to arrive in the mail. Hopefully, it won’t be the start of yet another species that I have to collect them all.

Hello to everyone else on DG.

The rain is easing, I must be off, back soon

Bye for now, Shirley

Pic 1 – neo Alcatraz
Pic 2 – neo Bullis’ Margaret
Pic 3 – neo Lou Wilson
Pic 4 – neo Quiz Queen

Nev - Justine splits her time between Christchurch & Singapore as her elderly mother is there as well as her job...
I will have to ask her if she is familiar with those gardens...
must put that on my list of things to do when we do a stop over in Singapore.

Hi all – Day 4 of the new year already; it’ll soon be Easter again what a terrible thought.

Not a lot achieved yesterday, just a bit more sorting and tidying up and getting the next lot of plants ready for re-potting. Both green bins are full of culls, so no more work in that department until Wednesday when the bins are emptied, and then into it again.

I am finding a lot of plants I forgot I even had; I guess the old memory isn’t near as good as I thought it was, but then they are all written down in a diary, if only I could remember where I put it for safe keeping.

Terrible fires in South Australia once again, gee those poor people are taking a pounding; I saw one bloke on TV last night who had lost everything and he said on the national news that it was all started by a neighbour who lit an incinerator to burn some rubbish. How stupid can some people be to do such a thing when there is a catastrophic fire danger warning in place?

I hope the fires are not anywhere near our Colleen and the boys; if they are though, don’t wait around too long Colleen get out with plenty of time to spare as soon as the evacuation warning is announced.

Shirley – It’s good to hear you’re getting a bit of rain at least, we had our share during December and still the occasional overnight light shower, not anything heavy but enough to wet everything, make the weeds grow like crazy and increase the humidity to a most uncomfortable level, but boy oh boy, don’t the brom’s love it?

Pleased to hear you are well except for the usual aches and pains that we all have to put up with. It’s interesting to hear Michael is doing his family tree. My wife works as a volunteer at the Kiama Family History Centre and has done so since she retired. That’s her hobby and the Light Railway is mine (apart from brom’s of course). This all started when she set out to do our family tree, she was already armed with a lot of info. done by an aunty of hers, so she thought it would be a breeze. When she joined up with the Centre she soon learned that things aren’t always as they seem and you must check, double check and in some cases triple check some info. It turned out that a lot of the info she had been given was very, very wrong; e.g one relative was shown as getting married before she was even born, Ha! Ha!

Another thing they are finding at the History Centre, with people who are coming in for help is that they are now getting more and more info. off various sites such as “Ancestry.com” (which incidentally has an enormous amount of great info. but as it can be put on by anyone, it’s not necessarily thoroughly checked first and is sometimes incorrect). So I guess it’s a lot like names on brom tags, don’t trust what you read until you have thoroughly checked it.

Good luck with the Dyckia; I have some Cacti growing friends who grow them, but personally I’ve never been a fan of these very prickly types. It does however show just how varied the world of bromeliads really is and some of these have magnificent brilliant orange coloured flowers, now if only an Aechmea had such coloured flowers. When my friend (who grows Dyckias) knew I was growing brom’s, he gave me what he said was a link to the largest photographic index of Dyckias in the world. You may like to brose though it one day when you have nothing to do Ha! Ha! It’s at: http://dyckiabrazil.blogspot.com.au/

I haven’t seen it before but I like your Neo. ‘Alcatraz’ in the first picture. This is another from Chester Skotak’s impressive range of hybrids and was bred from Neo. (carolinae variegated x Skotak's Tiger) x Skotak’s Tiger. It’s a nicely marked plant, however I would have thought that with a ”double dose” of Skotak’s Tiger in the parentage, the banding would have been more emphasised.

I can’t find Neo. ‘Bullis’ Margaret’ on the B.C.R. but I can find a ‘Margaret’, unfortunately, there’s no photo. When I looked on the F.C.B.S. site I found Margaret again and this time with an accompanying photo. This could be your plant, because if you disregard the banding (Which is often a temporary seasonal marking due to sudden temperature extremes) it looks very much like your plant.

I think the Bullis’ part of the name may have been on the original name tag to identify where it was purchased from (Bullis Bromeliads in Florida) as it is clearly shown in their online catalogue as just plain Neo.’Margaret’. (See just like tracking down family members with family research)
See: http://www.bullisbrom.com/categories.php?cid=14

Your next plant of Neo ‘Lou Wilson’ was made in 1992 by the interesting crossing of
Neo. (carolinae x concentrica) x ‘Big Blue’ as the seed parent and Neo.’Big Blue’ x concentrica’ as the pollen parent. Like so many other concentrica hybrids the concentrica influence is very obvious.

Again, Neo.‘Quiz Queen’ (Pic.4) is another I’m not familiar with but immediately suspected it was another Skotak hybrid. When I checked I see that its seed parent is Neo. (carolinae variegated x Hannibal Lector); this has been responsible for producing some wonderful colours such as ‘After Shock’, ‘Blushing Zebra’, ‘Groucho’ and ‘Wild Rabbit’ to mention just a few of the better known ones

Teresa – I’m sure Justine will know what you’re talking about when you mention these gardens as the word went out worldwide when it was first announced they were going to be built, and no expense was spared.

If you ever go to Singapore it’s definitely a “must see” as a few of my friends from the brom society have been there and rave about it. Personally, from what I’ve seen, I like the conventional gardens and the giant shade house but I’m not a fan of the futuristic sculptures which look too artificial for me and seem to detract from the overall theme of “Gardens by the Bay”. Because of its magnitude (Built on 101 hectares of reclaimed land), I guess there is something there to appeal to everyone.

A few pic’s to finish with firstly one of my NOIDS for a change, I’m pretty sure it’s a concentrica hybrid but can’t be certain. Pic.2 has been around for a long time and is Neo.’Fireball’ x ‘Granada’, a nice little plant that adapts well to basket culture. Pic.3 is Neo.’Rosatina’ x concentrica, nothing special looking at the picture, but it is a large plant up to 3’ across and the leaf tips really “glow” on a mature plant. Pic.4 is another “oldie” but still a favourite of mine, Neo ‘Pink Fantasia’; this unregistered hybrid has been around down here for years and its main appeal is that it clumps up very quickly. Finally one I’ve posted recently, Neo.’Midnight Moment’. This is very popular because of the many different colour changes it goes through before it reaches maturity.

All the best, Nev.

terrible images of the Aussie bush fires on our news last night.
If one was indeed started by lighting an incinerator then I imagine the person responsible is going to to be in serious trouble.

Canterbury has a High Fire Risk warning in place right now.

The Fire Service were worried about this summer as we had terrible storms that bought down many trees - perfect fuel for fires.

They have been onto property owners about clearing up storm debris - our local firewood depot has so much stacked up - I have never seen their yard so full.

Here's hoping the fires in Aussie are controlled before too long - and that they don't cause the same tragic loss of life as happened in the past.

take care everyone
Teresa

Good morning everyone.
I made a new thread for the new year. ...
We are now over here....
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/1383878/

Its been very hot here for a couple of days but after a rain shower last night, this morning is lovely and sunny but cool.
A rest for the plants after the very muggy heat.
I am pleased that my broms seem to be doing well despite the heat.
The pups are getting bigger, but I will wait a while before removing them.

I am starting up on my oil painting again .
It is a relaxing hobby and I will most likely end up with a room full of canvases as its hard to sell them with all the artists out there.
I enjoy it anyway .

Lots of lovely posts to read today, but I wont reply to them all or I would be here for ages.
I may not come on often but do love to see who is here and I always enjoy your interesting thoughts, Nev.

Take care everyone and keep cool.

only some old pics again. must get new ones.
neos Beefsteak, Aztek & Burbank

Jean

This message was edited Jan 4, 2015 9:27 AM