Canna Musifolia in flower.

I've been so intent on watching my one and only Strelitzia bud, ready for the "Bursting out" comp, that I didn't notice the Canna Musifolia had popped out a flower. Blimey. Photos of the flower taken this morning.

The trellis is 8 feet high.


Pictured from the top of some steps, on the other side of the trellis.


This is the canna put outside at the beginning of May, and it was moved 6 feet to the left when the wind died down..


I over wintered the canna without letting it go dormant. The idea being to have tall big foliage from the start of the season. Never thought it would flower.

Nik

 

Brilliant, Nik!

I'm looking every day for my Canna, a green-leaved Brilliant (bright red) to open any day.

I don't hold out much luck on my BoP. I bought it as a present from my father the Christmas before last and it had two buds on it which finally, finally opened - never thought they would. They bloomed for about four months. However, this past year I've had nothing.

I also have four small (3 inches tall!) BoPs which I nutured from seed a year ago, 4 out of 5 germinating wasn't bad. They are cheap here, 5 seeds for 99c (about 70p). So, I have another six years to go before they flower, ho, hum ... I was wondering if I left them in their little five-inch clay pot would they bloom earlier with mini flowers?

 

Thats a tall one Nik, just interested what happens when the flower dies? Wont you have to wait for a new stem to come up from the base in order to get more flowers.
Lady of leisure, I had brilliant, its a good name for that one.
Dont give up on the BoP, they sulk a bit after being planted from a pot, and take a few years to get back to flowering I've found.
If I lived where you do I'd be potting them little ones on as fast as I could, ready to plant out as soon as poss.

 

Hi, Pete!

This is my second year with the Billiant ... and they were absolutely "brill" last year .. many, many flowers for many, many months.

My BoP is in a pot, a 40cm clay pot, moved on from its original plastic do-dah I bought it in (technical jargan, that). I unfortunately don't have the "earth space" to plant it in the ground as we are on rock .. most odd for the middle of the orchards!

Do you still think I should plant the little ones on into a bigger pot?

 

The mind boggles .. forgot to say, Pete, the Brilliant (not Billiant) are actually in the ground in a little spot between rocks and I had five or six flower last year.

 

So here we are, You've got the climate and I've got the soil, Lady of leisure, its all a bit annoying.
I grow BoP in pots because I need to protect them in the winter and you grow them in pots because you dont have any soil, its crazy.
I dont think the little ones will flower earlier in 5in pots, the smallest pots I have managed to get flowers is 10in, and then the flowers weren't good.
I know they suggest they like to be pot-bound, but I've grown them in a greenhouse with free root run and they flower better, once established, I think.
Presume your main problem with growing cannas is getting them enough water.

[ 15. June 2006, 09:52 PM: Message edited by: pete ]

 

Only this year we've put the Cannas on irrigation ... we're still working on that aspect of life in the heat!

I see BoPs all over the place here, huge and beautiful, in the earth, blooming all year round, but I can't do it in my rocky ground.

Sometimes life's a b*tch wherever you are ... but I won't give up ..

 

I bought the Canna Musifolia believing that it was most unlikely to flower in the UK, but that it would produce tall large foliage, which is exactly what I wanted. The first summer it produced one stem about 7 feet tall with lovely big leaves. This died down and overwintered in the garage. Last summer it produced five stems 7 feet tall with lovely big leaves, and I decided to try overwintering it "in the green" to see what it did later. I am doing this to Cannas. It survived the winter in the leantoo which is maintained at 3�°C min. One stem, the fattest, has produced a flower. So in answer to your question Pete, unless I can find a 7 foot vase, its four to go and one spare. There are new stems growing up from the base as well.

Nik

 

Hey, guys, I'm obviously in the wrong climate for these Cannas! I think soil, soil, soil .. not rock, rock, rock is what they like. And, just for what's it's worth, as a bonus they seem to like the English climate!

More power to you ... and I'll weep over mine ..

 

Lady of Leisure,
You live in Portugal, oohh how I envy you. I was 50 before travel dragged me away from the UK, and Portugal was my first port of call, but only for a week mind, in case I didn't like the heat. Biiiig mistake!! I returned every six weeks or so for the next two years. It is still my first love.
It was there that I first saw Rubber Plants the size of a house, Bougainvilleas that grew all over house ends, Cannas like weeds, and Lemons and Daturas etc etc. It inspired the "Meddy" patio corner of my garden. Sadly, I couldn't afford the house prices, so I settled on Spain.
I saw somewhere that you should feed and pot on BoPs furiously until they are of flowering age, five or six years, then let them get pot bound.

Nik

 

Another one of the five stems is flowering now. I'll have to erect a viewing platform at this rate.

Nik

 

Nik .... viewing platform !!!! greenhouse step comes to mind !! .... :D :D :D M-L

 

M-L.....I am prone to these Cava fuelled flights of fancy you know. But worry ye not, the greenhouse steps have progressed. Shuttering is in place, well nearly, it's "nearby". The greenhouse is empty anyway ATM, apart from the poor Buddas Hand lemon which I fear has left us. The steps down to the greenhouse level are well under way too, but pressure of work has stopped them.
The soil heep is growing again with all these excavations, and is so big you can see the blue plastic tarpaulin over it on Google Earth.

 

Since last chatting, I've had one Brilliant bloom and die and two are blooming now. Would take a picture but the sun's in the wrong place :D so will wait till later in the day

Where are you in Spain, Nik? Close enough to just pop over the border? Personally, I'm not that fond of Eastern Algarve. It's true, house prices sky-rocketed here but we were fortunate to find a ruin which had already had some work done on it such as plumbing and electricity installed and a cisterna put underground; also the donkey shed had been converted to a kitchen ... no, a space would a kitchen could be :D Even ruins now don't come cheap, though!

 

Hi guys,
I am learning so much from this forum -
I bought two Canna's from a garden centre as I liked the foliage and they where going for �£1.49 each,they were two and a half feet tall but had no labels. One has bronze leaves the other green. Since I looked then up and found they were Canna's I have been waiting for flowers to further itentify them. Having read your words of wisdom I will stop looking once a day and make it once a year!!!