What's looking exotic in 2016

What's looking tropical ........well ok not in my actual home.
My holiday home......this week anyway.

To all my friends on GC from sunny Crete.

 

Nice one @roders , looks a bit too hot out there for me, I much prefer squelching around over here, I dont think

Anyway, just thought I show a couple of pics of this begonia, @strongylodon sent me a couple of tubers some years ago, I think its B. evansiana.
The best thing about it is, it seems almost totally hardy, and spreads itself around in the garden over the years, it seems to find the damp spots and then takes over, and comes back better each year.
The foliage is great, but later it has pink flowers.
First pic, growing through a crack in old concrete, I didn't plant it there.


Second pic, where it has taken over on a raised bed that, due to shrubs at the back, normally gets pretty dry.


Although it self sows, it never gets out of hand.

 

Nice shots 'Roders, it's been very hot there this week so my Brother tells me, around 34/37c and he stays indoors until September!!!

 

Roders - lovely pictures from the real home of tropical plants.

Do, please, show us more.

Pete - I am learning that there are some very interesting foliage plants in the Begonia genus, outside of the usual bedding ones.

 

Voodoo Lilly coming into flower not opened yet

 

Well there is John, if its hardy with me it will be hardy with you.
Must admit I was sceptical,(not like me I know), but its gone through even the cold ones, just dieing back to the tubers.

 

Started to open tonight

 

Hi all - regarding solanum laciniatum... I planted a small plant out last summer, and it's now over 6 foot tall. Any thoughts as to how well it would handle severe pruning in the autumn? It's smothering a mitraria and a cantua buxifolia!

 

Begonia grandis Evansiana is fully hardy remaining as a dormant tuber in winter, they do self seed and have scented flowers (if you are close enough). There is also a white flowered form (alba).

 

Does your Cantua bloom for you in the ground? I've found it completely root hardy but it only blooms for me in a pot kept frost free.

As far as the Solanum goes, autumn would be completely the wrong time to prune it in my opinion.

 

Yesterday, I had this ...




This morning I have two!!!
(Slightly hidden by the foliage, but definitely there beneath the main one and just as smelly )



It's clearly thriving in that space and with no effort from me at all

 

They look a nice size m
Mine is in its first year
I have a few better ones in the greenhouse but they not flowering can not remember there name of top of my head do you know what you have