Kalanchoes Potted Up

Hard to believe that I wrote to pot up Kalanchoe cuttings and actually did so and put them where I wrote they should go. Immediately I broke a bloom, watering other plants.

Kalanchoe cuttings

Work started on the Mule Barn on Monday. Freezes are coming so it may progress slowly.

Hyacinths are starting to open. I expected all the dark bulbs to be blue or purple. First opening is pink. I noticed in some of the NW Garden Show photos that they mixed all colors willy nilly in an explosion of color.

I like to separate mixed bulbs into similar bulb colors and see what kind of combos I get. My favorites are shades of pink and lavenders, or several blues together. Yellow and white works well too. Maybe next year I'll order off for more combos or all of a color for different spots.

I've been watering a good-sized potted Agapanthus from seed and a pot with several plants with similar leaves that I thought were also Agapanthus. I looked more closely today. I think the pot with the smaller leaves is a pot full of seedling Amaryllis with small bulbs formed. Won't that be a daisy? They are crowded and need separating.

You would think I would label better. Then there would not be all these little surprises, however.

Bloom Day in the Greenhouse

Just a peek at a few blossoms.

Begonias are usually a sure thing for blooms.

Stunning in red, they are pretty in pink, too.

Mistletoe Cactus Rhipsalis has fat buds about to open.

There are white Begonia blooms at lower left, just so you

know I have white, too.  Amaryllis bulbs are slow so this

is as close to a bloom as I have, a fat Benfica bud.

Behind are Kalanchoes just coming into bloom and you 

can see tomatoes in the back ground. I picked 3, ripe.

Tomatoes are still blooming too.

Spider plant entered into the spirit of things with little

white blooms on long, long stems.

Chlorophytum comosum blooms, little spiders on the ends.

First of Pentas cuttings to bloom. Ready for Spring.

 Usually there are blue conehead blooms on Persian Shield in late winter. Only Purple Heart has blooms so far. They are in separate pots but jammed in together willy nilly under a bench for a little shade.

Hyacinths are blooming outside while these just kind of 

took their time. At least the buds were not killed when I 

put them in a refrigerator to chill where there was fruit. 

I dressed the pots with moss as the Swedish do.

Winter is not over. These will be wonderful in bloom.

Join the fun at May Dreams Gardens on Sunday to see what's blooming in gardens everywhere. 

If you haven't a bloom to show, rush out and buy an orchid plant. They are not nearly as difficult as you've been led to believe. The one I bought before Christmas has just shed its last bloom and my older plants have new bloom stalks emerging, one with fat buds the size of grapes. I keep mine in the house in an east-facing window.

Sunday Best in the Greenhouse

We're having a warm spell during which I need to haul everything out and do some cleaning one day soon.

Kalanchoes are blooming and blooming and blooming.

Easily rooted, they bloom most of the winter.

Should I get other colors?

Burro Tail sedum. Every little bean that breaks off will

make a new plant. It takes time, faster with a longer piece.

Purple Heart Setcreasea and Persian Shield/Strobilanthes.

Both are starting to bloom.

I think this is a red and white 

Amaryllis, maybe Minerva. 

Various stages of bloom. Fun. 

Mostly Appleblossom, the unopened tight buds.

Another view of Appleblossom. When I'm in the greenhouse, what a treat to catch a whiff of the sweet fragrance of Appleblossom, a good reason for having several and timing the blooms to open in sequence. (You don't really think I planned that, do you?) New bulbs are blooming later than the one from a previous year because they were planted late, but it is a thought, to start them 2 or 3 weeks apart.

Are your forced bulbs all done? Do you have plans for forced bulbs next year?

Babyland

I can't help myself. Every stem with leaves, every seed, every bulb needs sticking in some soil.

The need to plant cuttings is why I have Kalanchoes lined up on a board outside the greenhouse and three old plants with tender foliage crying out to be used in a similar way.  If I can coax them to bloom just before Christmas I can find homes for them.

Schlumbergeras and their kin the Easter Cactus have rooted themselves into dozens.

Bromeliads have a curious way of reproducing by making offsets after they bloom. The ones on the left have tiny insignificant blue blossoms in the centers. New plants are forming around them. The one on the right was in bloom when I bought it. It has all but died off and new plants are surrounding the old one. I didn't make a new photo of the tillandsia in the greenhouse that has new plants forming in the center of the plant instead of around the edges. I think they can all stay in one pot after I repot.

 

Every little bean that fell off my Burro's Tail made a new plant.

I have a plan for these, really. Martha Stewart's greenhouse has a display with Burro's Tail and Mistletoe Cactus which is another plant that I just happen to have divided....

 

I could not resist tucking a couple of seeds from a Gerbera Daisy into a yoghurt cup. These can go to live in the garden when they reach some size. It has been a good year for growing Gerberas, though they've been shy to bloom, the bigger ones.

 

Little Plants are  like kittens. finding homes is not easy. I am to a point that I rarely go into a garden center any more except to buy potting soil and more pots.

 

On the other hand, I am making lists of fall planted bulbs and will order soon.

 

I did not garden today. It rained all day, slow drizzle mostly, an inch and a half.

 

I vowed when Gardenia foliage obscured white Azaleas in the spring that I would cut them back when they finished bloom.

Yesterday the heat index here was reported by local TV station as 100 degrees. Projects outside must be done in stages. So far I’ve cut all of two Gardenias and part of another, only 3 to go.

When I cut shrubbery, it is very hard for me not to save every piece for rooting.

There are 7 rooted Gardenias outside the greenhouse. There’s really no reason to root more.

There are a half dozen rooted white Kalanchoe in anticipation of Christmas. Stock plants have new foliage that begs rooting as well. Sometimes I just can't restrain myself.

I really got carried away with Schlumbergera.

Epiphyllums are summering on a makeshift bench. There are 3 buds on one, soon to bloom

Epiphyllum, soon to bloom.

This one had 3 buds. One failed, the one on the right. Sometimes they abort for lack of water, sometimes for another reason I don’t know. Ugly foliage is on the ground in a tray. Sometimes a yellow leaf will root and everything turn green and make a good plant. I have 5 pots now, the last three were pieces that broke off and I rooted.

Other people are plant collectors who want one of every cultivar. I want dozens of the one I have.

Indoor Plants Prepare for the Out of Doors

TThe first bud on Brugmansia cuttings appeared this week. Those who made it over the winter outside  had foliage emerge early only to be bitten back to the ground by frost; more foliage is visible now.

These inside seem to know it is time. I read that they have to have a side shoot before they bloom. This is one of the few without a second shoot. Maybe cuttings are different.

Kalanchoe cuttings are in bigger pots. Looking forward to next Christmas, I expect to have pots of white Kalanchoe and Schlumbergera in five colors. Christmas Cactus cuttings had filled their little six-pack, so now there's a good-sized pot and a little pot. There is another six-pack of small cuttings of each color that I plan to use in filling grapevine balls. I might be getting carried away with Christmas Cactus.

These and Epiphyllums will summer under shade outside.

Easter Cactus has a few buds but I don't think they'll open for Easter. Rhipsalidopsis species is a natural forest cactus, unlike the Schlumbergeras which are tropical forest cacti. The primary difference between the various 'Easter, Christmas, and Thanksgiving' cactuses is their time of bloom. The leaf shape varies as well.

Ike thinks everything in the greenhouse belongs to him. He supervised sorting/soaking Cycad seeds.

 

 

We hope that failure to float means the bigger seeds are viable. When the seed coat that inhibits growth softens and is scraped away, we'll plant seeds.

This is the last bloom on 'Nymph' amaryllis. Amaryllis outside have buds.