A December Peek at Tomatoes and Hyacinths and Things

We've moved into typical Gulf Coast December weather, where there's fog at night and mist in the daytime. He-Who wonders about these things could not decide why we had no tomatoes in the fall.

Sure enough, as soon as night-time temperatures fell, we commenced to see small tomatoes.  Pollen fails in heat. There are tomatoes that set fruit in hot weather but few are indeterminate types, which are necessary for continued growth and fruit set over months, even years.

Tomatoes are sharing space with Thanksgiving Cacti in bloom.

Holiday Cacti are sharing space with Hyacinths. My hyacinth trials using last years' bulbs that were allowed to grow on in their little pots were a success considering that many of them did set buds and bloom again after chill; a failure as far as size.

 They have as great a fragrance as ever despite the small size and sparse blossoms. The bulbs will go into the garden after blooms fade.

Arrowhead vine and Foxtail fern keep company with Chlorophytum and a bromeliad decorated with a begonia flower.

Areca palm culm that I pulled out of the big pot by accident has made another plant. Rooted Persian  Shield with Purple Heart and Purple Jew are crowded in with Begonias and Dark Alternanthera that grows in pots and in the floor at will.

Still outside awaiting a freeze to encourage dormancy are potted Agapanthus.

Inside, I'm waiting for the sun to shine. Maybe I'll make a fruitcake today.

Birds in a Nest for Foliage Follow Up

New foliage is sprouting out everywhere, inside and out.

Birds Nest Fern with new Birds. This one loves a little shade.

Bromeliad with a friend.

A closer look at froggie.

What? Oh, yes. Foliage.

Stobilanthes and Purple Heart cuttings are about ready to go in the ground. 

Tillandsia cyanea Blossoms

Tillandseas first put on pink quills in July, with a first bloom in September. I was pleasantly surprised to find blossoms this morning.

Pink Quills last a long time, the blue blooms are sporadic and short-lived. 

I'm impatient for my other Bromeliad that grows quills to have new spathes. I don't know how long it takes the quill form Vriesea to bloom from a pup. With Bromeliads, there is always something to watch or watch for. 

Cooler weather is coming. 

These Bromeliads Leave Me Wordless

End of the Grapevine Ball

Steve Asbell calls them 'Rainforest Drops' and makes them using cuttings tucked into purchased grapevine balls full of soil and moss.

I made my own grapevine ball and tucked rooted cuttings with a ball of root-filled soil into moss in the grapevine ball. I set it on a pot rather than suspending it.

I added Graptopetalum and a Bromeliad. It grew and bloomed.

At the end of it's second Christmas, The grapevine was brittle

and the Bromeliad just did not look happy.

I dis-assembled the whole thing, 

cutting the grapevine so as not to destroy the plants.

I ended up with a pot full of Schlumbergera cuttings and another pot full of Graptopetalum. I like my Christmas Cactuses in pots alone or in a group of like cuttings. Graptopetalum is good for a number of succulent projects.

The Neoregelia in the orange pot is the one from the grapevine ball. It looks happier already, potted up. It is smaller than the ones behind it, younger pups not showing much color yet because they're just been removed from the mother plant. 

There is no Bloom Day in the Greenhouse

Well, there is no Bloom Day in the greenhouse except for a few pots of White Begonias.

Begonias are still in there because I have not settled on where they're going. I'd like pots of white Begonias beside my curved bench in shade but I don't want to lug water to them every day or two. Maybe I'll do it anyway. It would join an urn with some very green Spider Plants with white stripes.

Today I put up shade on the west end of the greenhouse. I used some non-woven polyester material that some chairs we bought last year were wrapped in. It was too good to throw away; I knew it would come in handy. It was a very professional hanging -- I used paper clips, the metal kind with little wires that fold back. 

They come in all sizes and are very handy.

Even with shade and mist, it's too hot for most plants in the greenhouse through the summer.

 No blooms but this Bromeliad, ghost plant, jungle cactus sphere is still in the greenhouse. It appreciates the mist as it sits on the floor, the coolest spot. The rest of the Bromeliads are outside, or given away.

Outside the greenhouse, a watermelon has volunteered in the flower bed, the Sweet Williams are dying off before blooming and there's this:

Gerbera seedling.

A Look Back at April in the Greenhouse

 

 

 

A look back and a look forward.

 

Easter Cactus bloomed late. Maybe we'll call it a Mother's Day Cactus.

 

Perhaps we chould use the botanical names of all these epiphytes; my cactuses that are designated as Thanksgiving Cactus by some growers because of the segment shape bloom precisely at Christmas. I call them Christmas Cactuses even though they're not the old Christmas Cactus my Mother grew.I can remember Schlumbergera but Rhipsalidopsis gaertneri does not roll easily off my tongue.

 

I spent time setting up a stepped bench for the cactuses in the greenhouse today. I think they might be happier spending the summer out on the north side of the greenhouse rather than trying to keep them cool inside. All those little rooted pieces are turning into a bigger collection that I expected. A good plan might be to set out a row of Gardenia cuttings on the north side and make my temporary benches behind the Gardenias so they are less vulnerable to pet traffic.

 

The little Kalanchoe cuttings are suddenly 8 inches tall and it is a long time until Christmas.

 

 

 

Bomeliads are needing a summer home, or should  they stay inside under mist?

 

Tillandsia babies will be ready to pot before summer is over.

All the tomato seeds sprouted, Cassias are sprouting, another legume for butterflies.

Only one Pride of Barbados seed sprouted. There's still time for the others. Outside, I have 7 Caesalpinias that returned from roots. Two are established plants. The other five are second year seedlings that I hope will bloom this year.

There's a fat bud on one of the Agapanthus outside! It took forever last year to get a few blooms. These are starting early after a mild winter in which the tops were not killed back.

I think I saw two tiny Tithonia seedlings today and I am sure of Madagascar periwinkles coming up thick and fast. These two do not have to be started in the greenhouse here, reseeding in place.

 

I noticed today that there are tiny tomatoes on a volunteer I let grow in the new flower bed on the south side of the greenhouse. We'll have 'Tommy Toes' for salad and then I'll pull it when the Lantana beside it gets going. I have only one white Lantana plant. I'm waiting for white blooms in the front garden so I can take cuttings.

 

Many of my chores were outside. I gave the self-seeded petunias a haircut to keep them blooming and get rid of the seed heads of the rye grass in that bed. I pulled a few weeds, too.

 

I moved an Echinacea, moved some 'Sweetness' daffodils, transplanted some striped Cannas. It doesn't seem like much when I'm doing little chores but they add up. We got sprinkles of welcome rain, hardly enough to run me inside. Tonight it's raining again. 

 

Indoor Greenhouse Plants are Moving Outdoors

Before the rain started, I planted out 5 Brugmansia cuttings, saving 2 to give away and one to plant in a large container.

 

Brug awaiting potting.

 

Last year's Brugs are starting to put out new growth from the roots.

Underneath the Brugs, I'll put Purple Datura seedlings with White Daturas below

them, layering by size.

 

I never meant to become a Bromeliad collector. Starting out with just one, then another, as they put on pups, suddenly I'm growing bromeliads everywhere.

This Tillandisia was a tiny thing with a pretty pink paddle with blue blooms.

The blooms have finished and pups are forming in the center.

Pups forming around a Bromeliad Guzmania.

 

 Easter Cactus Rhipsalidopsis that failed to bloom on our schedule is putting on buds for a season of bloom. Someone gave me this beautiful Cactus. I have an intermediate size that I rooted and a smaller rooted cutting -- another collection along with 5 colors of Schlumbergera. I'm delighted to have all the Christmas Cactuses in season. They just need maintenance the rest of the year.

Angel Wing Begonia Blossoms

 

My Begonias are turning into a collection, too. I cut off the tops of some leggy Angel Wings back in the winter. The tops rooted, the original stems put out new growth. Suddenly I have a pot full of new. I'm looking for more, different.

 

 

Night Blooming Cereuses -- another collection

Epiphyllums have lined up on an improvised bench under shade of a Juniper tree.

 

Am I becoming a plant hoarder?

 

By the way, I cleaned the Cycad seeds and planted a half dozen, just to see if they sprout.

 

 

 

 

Staghorn Fern and Friends

Staghorn ferns belong to the genus Platycerium. I bought this plant in a tiny plastic pot for $2.00 last winter at a big box store.

The plant produces two distinctly different fronds, basal and foliar.

Basal fronds, often called “sterile fronds,'' are rounded thickened fronds which grow in overlapping layers and clasp onto a growing surface. Shield shaped, they protect the roots, collect nutrients and
take up water.

Antler shaped foliar fronds also called fertile fronds, grow spores on the underside for reproduction.

This plant spent last summer in this same spot, seemingly loving the heat and humidity and sun.

This winter I brought my Bird's Nest Fern Asplenium nidus from the house where it was not particularly happy to the greenhouse.

I didn't start out to be a Rainforest gardener but between the Epiphyllums, Schlumbergera, Ferns and Bromeliads I'm getting there.

 

Epiphyllum oxypetalum.

Flauntin' my Flowers with Tootsie on Fertlizer Friday

The Termperature Takes a Downturn, not Spring after All

Just when everything was budded out and starting to burst into bloom and we're talking 'early spring' the wind shifts to the north and cold blows in. We expect 25ºF tonight and 27º tomorrow night with a high tomorrow of 52º which may seem balmy to some but is uncomfortable in the South.

I even wrapped little volunteer tomatoes with improvised row cover. Tommies Toes will be such a treat for salad if I can keep them going and since they are there....

When the sun peeked out today the greenhouse warmed to the seventies and I transplanted some rootbound Pentas.

I went ahead and tucked a Neoreglia bromeliad into this pot of Wax Begonias.

Now to find a use for a tray of Kalanchoe cuttings and many Spider plants.

 

The bromeliad I used is a little sister to this one.

 



 

I made a big mistake today. I had a packet of Nigella seeds so I sowed them in an 18 cell tray of planting mix. Wait! Nigella dislike transplanting and beside that, should have been direct sowed last November. I knew that. I'm wavering between trying to transplant before the taproot gets very big and scooping the tops off the cells and sprinkling them in the bed with all those volunteer petunias. Nigella would probably be most happy there.

 

I dragged the pepper plants I cut back and the two eggplant plants with blooms back into the greenhouse. They'd been enjoying the air outside until it got so cold.

 

I have a little list of seeds to order off for. Black Pearl Peppers, White Madagascar periwinkles and some Geraniums. Last year I intended to buy a geranium plant and never did. I saw somebody's blog -- maybe it was Tootsie's -- where geranium seeds have sprouted and I decided.... No one vendor I've looked at have all three kinds of seeds. Does anybody know one who does?

 

 

 

 

Bloom Day in the Greenhouse February, 2013

Remember that this is a hobby greenhouse, inexpensive but affordable as compared to the better quality structures usually seen on blogs. Ten by 12 feet; a greenhouse is never big enough.

Gipsy Queen Hyacinths are nearing the end of bloom.

Hyacinths outside are blooming now. Forced in pots of soil,

these can go into the ground when they fade, to bloom again next year.

Heated by two small electric heaters set to come on low fan speed when the temperature dips below 37 degrees in a climate where prolonged freezes are rare, plants are grown for pleasure.

Pentas cuttings, not as happy as they would be in a warmer season, will

go outside for the delight of butterflies when the weather warms.

In the blue pot on the shelf above them, Neoregelia bromeliad.

 

Pots of Pineapple Sage with a branch of Russelia

equisetiformis hanging over them with similar blooms.

 

Persian Shield cuttings are blooming, blossoms usually only seen in winter.

Strobilanthes dyerianus is used in the summer garden for purple foliage.

 

Kalanchoe in bloom at left, cuttings in near view beginning to bloom.

Behind is a pot of pink Begonias.

I'm thinking of taking out some Begonias and putting a Neoregelia  bromeliad in

the pot with Begonias, an idea suggested by Steve Asbell of Rainforest Gardens

 

When warm weather comes I may combine Kalanchoes with Graptopetalum.

 

Thank you for visiting my greenhouse.

 

We're celebrating February Bloom Day with Carol of May Dreams Gardens.

 

My outdoor blooms are on Secrets of a Seedscatterer. February Gold is the theme.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Come Look for a Blossom

We are having mild days here while much of the country suffers ice and snow. February freezes are inevitable. Cold wind will blow in from the North soon while we are enjoying what feels like spring.

During the day, a ventilating fan keeps the temperature tolerable for plants.

Cool season veggies just hang out on Ike's porch.

Tomatoes are growing toward the back. We need to look more closely.

I love my patchwork pattern in the center floor. Found it in the New

York Times; it was a driveway there. Urban stone, sideways brick and

river stones in the seams. I've started dropping blue glass gems in the cracks.

 

Forced hyacinths. The pots with three bulbs hold 'Gypsy Queen'

'Blue Jacket' almost ready to bloom for Chinese New Year.

Almost ready to eat! I wasn't sure I could pull this off without blossom rot.

The second tomato plant has a single fruit and some blooms.

We need a few nights at 55º F to set fruit.

 

White pots behind have Gerbera Daisy seedlings and a

daylily seedling extra. Two in one takes less space.

 

Thyme cuttings. I almost let all my Thyme die, so we're starting over.

 Brugmansia cuttings think Spring is at hand. I have shoots at the base of those outside. The
next freeze will take those away, I believe.

Second bloom stalk on 'Nymph' Amaryllis; Begonias behind.

 

I hope you enjoyed this little peek at my plants.