You have your own indoor batanical garden, Kathy. Just beautiful.
Jim
What's In Your Garden, Part 4
Thanks, Jim. I"m happy I finally have flowers to post besides orchids!!
Lovely blooms to brighten up your COLD wintery day.
Hello All, the orchid I ordered the other day Blc Glenn Maidment 'Aranbeem' is not in stock so instead I ordered: Lc. Carl Borhshine 'Mendenhall' x Blc Liese Pigors 'OA' Flare x Blc. Memoria Grant Eichler 'Lenette". I'm not at all familiar with this one. Are any of you? Lee
Whoa! That's a mouthful. You'd think they'd give it one name. Is it from Hausermann?
No Boo, it's from C&H. Lee
It's really getting cold and windy outside tonight. We even may get a freeze. My orchids are all inside and several trees are covered with Christmas lights on the inside of the blankets. I don't think it will be as bad as last year's disaster.
I'm all set to go down to Fred's place this Sunday for the roundup. I wish some of you were coming along for company. It's a three hour trip each way. I'll be sure to take some pictures.
Jim
It only went down to 35 last night. No sign of frost or freeze damage. One more night to go and the warm up starts. My poor orchids miss the sun and daily misting.
Jim
Just heard the "growing areas" of FL are going to be 20-27 tonight. I assume they mean the northern third. The farmers are in trouble. It's pretty cold here. At least we've had a good deal of sun and the days are lengthening quickly. Plants are looking much better.
Wish I was there too Jim.
Beautiful hippeastrums and neat rhip. Kathy!
Here's the rhip today.
And a new hippeastrum that I thought was Unique.
Well, this used to be my Rhipsalis, but now it's my Hatiora salicornoides. lol Why do they keep changing these names around?
Oh no. I thought it was just orchids that can't make up their minds.....
Well, last night was not a good one. We got a good hard freeze. Temps here bottomed out at 29 degrees and once again it looks like someone took a flame thrower to the garden. It's to early to know what is lost and what is just wounded. I haven't taken off the blankets yet as it will be somewhat cold again tonight. Oh well...
Jim
So sorry Jim. You are truly living on a climatic zone edge. Hope everything pulls through.
Laurel
So sorry, Jim!
Everything is uncovered and the orchids are back in the lanai. It was 70 degrees this afternoon and will be warmer over the next few days. Surveying the damage, there is good news and bad news. I ran out of blankets before I got to my rare curly-Q copper plant and this is the result.
Jim
Another piece of bad news concerns my spindle palm. I wrapped the base and the growth head in blankets but could not cover all of the long frawns. Here it is today. I don't have a clue if it will make it or not.
Jim
This was a nice red firespike plant. I think I see some green at the base so it might make it.
Jim
And the nice blooming Persian shield I showed you a few days ago now looks like this, but it will be back.
Jim
Papaya. It will recover as well.
Jim
All of the iochroma was badly burned but not killed.
Jim
Some good news is that the passion vine looks like it will make it.
Jim
This was beautiful purple firespike blooming over golden mound duranta. After some pruning in the spring, it will rebound.
Jim
This is my red jatropha.
Jim
And the pink jatropha.
Jim
My banana stock wasn't quite ready to cut but I will have to cut it now and hang it in the garage. I don't know if it will be useful or not. Here is what it looks like in the garden today.
Jim
One last look at the destruction. This is some ginger. It will come back from the ground.
Jim
Now for some good news. The real tender things I covered with Christmas lights and blankets made it just fine. My mango tree and lychee tree are fine as is the staghorn fern, yellow elder, ixora and dwarf poinciana. Those little lights worked great. It didn't get as cold this year as last and I was better prepared. It will be a few weeks before I know for sure if anything is beyond saving. The crotons, begonias and all of my cymbidiums look just fine under the oak tree. Those cyms are tuff. And if a signal of better things to come, the dwarf azaleas are blooming
You took a beating for sure. Looks like fall here after a frost! Glad so many can come back from this and that your light system worked so well!
It's such a shame to see the damage - so sorry Jim. Glad to hear that there are things that will come back for you though.
Well, it takes 3 hours and 15 minutes to get from my house to Fred's and the distance is right at 200 miles. I'm lucky to have a new car which made the trip a bit more tolerable. As I expected, Fred's place is a dream; seven and a half acres of Florida's finest. What I didn't expect was Fred suffered as much, if not more, freeze damage than I did up in Tampa. It is all about micro-climates.
Here is a sample of what I saw.
Jim
I love the way the grass flows around the beds.
Jim
What a great Florida view.
Jim
Just wonderful and so much looks like it's been there for years!! Did you buy it with established gardens or did you do it all, Fred??
This huge elephant ears just sprung up in jungle. Nice to have plants like this growing wild on your property!
Jim
I'll let Fred respond, Kathy, but I can tell you that Fred has put the lion's share of work into this landscape. Here is a traffic stopper...a Bismark palm.
Jim
And another traffic stopper, a screw pine. I'd kill for one of these but fear I'm just too far north.
Jim
This message was edited Jan 28, 2009 5:06 PM
Just a final note on the trip; Fred and his wife were very gracious hosts and the assembled DGers were a joy as well. The food was delicious and I even came home with a dendrobium. Now that's a good day.
Jim
I soooo wish I could go to FL for Feb vacation like the old days. But money is now very tight. I miss seeing those great palm trees. And now I have friends to visit. Maybe some day!