Welcome to the 'Members Gallery'

they have been in the past, this years aren't in flower yet

 

HELP.....Got the picture up on photobucket and the address url right I think then where do I go from there? it is how do I get it on Gardeners Corner ?

 

Nathan
Re your picture posted on 4th Feb of FLOWERING Ipomea Purpurea. (Grrr) I have been doing what you do for three years, but get NO flowers. I only perservere because the colour is so good compared to the puny annuals. I do treat the cuttings as bedding plants, they stay out to wither, but the mother plant lives in the conservatory/shed all the time. Do you have a secret feed?
Nik

 

Nik, that was my picture, Nathan posted it for me because I was having trouble with pictures at the time.
As for the Ipomea, well, does the mother plant flower, if it does I think it might be the age of the cuttings. I find that young plants tend to make lots of vegative growth at first at expense of flowers.
Have you tried saving the cuttings from one year over to the next. That way you start out in spring with a much more mature plant already a bit pot bound, just pot it on a couple of pot sizes to give it a boost and I am pretty sure it will come into flower earlier. Having said that mine have only been flowering for about three weeks this year up to now.
Got to agree the flower size and colour is far superior to the seed grown types.
As for feed I just use tomato feed.

 

Nathan, thanks.
Pete, A wonderful picture.
Its a good point about overwintering the cuttings, I'll give that a go. The Mother plant doesn't flower much, two or three in the last three years. Discussing with "er indoors", neither of us have been feeding it, so we'll start now. The Grandmother plant, in Spain, flowers its socks off, so there is still hope.
As soon as I've got to grips with pictures here, I'll post one of our corner.
Nik

 

This is one side of the BBQ patio



Nik

 

Ah my sort of plants, Have you got 2 kinds of strelitzia there Nik, the one on the left looks like one of those real big ones, (its not a banana is it?)
The eucommis I find more or less hardy.

 

Pete
Spot on. The "Big" one is Strelitzia Nicolai, a birthday present last March. The other one is a pair of S. Reginas, which, after 4 years of TLC, both flowered this summer. The red fluffy things on the left are Ricinus seed pods, just a tad poisonous.
Nik

 

I've never grown it but I think your gonna struggle to accomadate Nicolai, that is unless you've got a palm house, the flowers are fantastic though.
Castor oil plants, do you believe it, some seed companies stopped selling seed a couple of years ago incase we all got poisoned.
THat looks a bit like a coleus front right but whats that to the left of it? With red flowers.

 

Pete
Our lean-to conservatory/shed has been called a nut house before, but never a palm house :D It can manage 10 feet high, just, so there is a way to go.
We got the castor oil seeds in Spain from a feral plant. With hindsight taking them on the plane could have triggered an international incident. :eek:
Er Indoors uses Coleus to hide the pots. Works a treat doesn't it. That thing with red flowers is an Hibiscus having a bad day.
There is a hint of purple Bougainvillea just above the Ricinus, and varigated Abutillons along the back. The Palms and the Lemon are out of shot on the right, and to the right of them, opposite this lot are the Fig, Cannas, Oleander, Olive, Daturas etc, with just enough room for a table, two chairs and the BBQ.
Nik

 

Sounds quite a collection, lets have a few more pics.
Talking hibiscus, I went round a local nursery today and they had a couple of hardy hibiscus for sale which were new ones on me.
The flowers weren't out but are supposed to be massive more like the tropical kinds. It was also evergreen I think, totally different to our usual syriacus.
Dont mention citrus, I've never had much luck with them in a pot.
It will be interesting to see if the nicolai can flower in 10 ft, even if it dont the leaves are pretty impressive. :D

 

Pete
Here are a few more pics. Standing at the top left corner of the overview you're rotating clockwise.(I hope) We are off for a week in the morning, and things are getting hectic. Apparantly a large cabin trunk for shoes for a week is not enough :rolleyes:
I travel in mine










And my favourite photo so far this year



Nik