What's looking exotic in August 2012

Lovely Pete. I am amazed at your climate - you don't see many of those plants outside around here.

That Campsis looks nice. I have just started to grow it, and have been alarmed to read that it may not flower if the summer is not hot enough. I will just have to be patient. I also read that it can be a bit invasive if it really likes you, but I don't think I am going to be worrying too much about that.

 

I'm sure you can get it to flower Peter, mine are about a month later than normal, but look to be going to flower OK
I blame it on the dismal summer.
Radicans does sucker quite freely, under paving etc, once established.

 

I've got a nice blue one (P. Incense), if you want me to root a cutting for you?

IME the flowers only last a day or two, so you need to keep the new flower buds coming to get more than one-at-a-time on the plant! Thus I reckon they need to be allowed to grow fairly big - decent sized "climbing-frame" for example. Fairly sure I read that some varieties hold their flwoers for longer, so might be worth sourcing one of those - e.g. if you only have space for one

I bought a plant from Jungle Seeds because they claim to have a darker blue - indeed, I like the shade that it is. It blooms profusely and all-over (yeah, you'll need to so0rt out the pruning as others have said). I can try a cutting of that too if you'd like to try that variety / colour.

 

I've converted it to a PDF file, which I will try to attach to this post

 

I tend to agree with Kristen on passion flowers.
If you get a cutting going its not likely to do much its first summer, then the minimum of pruning overwinter, to get good flowering the following year.

 

Well here's my measly collection (compared to all you guys ), lots of young plants, but they're getting there

Red Banana from Morrisons;


Banana from Lidl;


Erythrina Crista-galli, standing at 6ft 1in tall from seed this year;


Brugmansia from Peters's seed, just developing flower buds now;


Crystal Tree Lilies, not strictly tropical but they look very exotic, not quite fully open;


A few more photos to come tomorrow

 

really nice Bilbo , is the banana from lidl a cavendish? plus the banana from morrison look different to the red Maurelii I got , even if I bought one for £2 and look like yours but not like the 3 I`ve got.
they look like the Ensete Ventricosum

 

Hi Sal, the label said Ensete Maurelli, which I googled and found is the same as Ensete Venticosum Maurelli I think???

Not sure about the exact variety from Lidl as it didn't say but I think it probably is Cavendish??

 

the difference I see is that when I bought mine they where almost black and then they turned to mahogany red , this one like yours and mine it`s already green , I think they are all genetically cloned from the same producer sold all around at the same time , you got it from Morrison I got it from my local Gc .
If the lidl banana has few stain on red in the leaves it`s a cavendish , but the shape of the leaves are suggesting cavendish ....bit hard to keep .

 

I would expect a Maurelii to be darker? or get a Montbeliardii which is both darker and more "butch" looking

Jungle Plant have theirs on 25-50% off and free carriage at present. They have really good quality plants, but they aint cheap (both of the above are £15 each) - however, if you can overwinter one getting one of their small ones in the sale now would make a great plant for next year.

http://www.junglegardens.co.uk/contents/en-uk/d1_Banana_Plants.html

Sorry, can't remember which of mine is which, I'll check the labels tomorrow. Definitely one is E. Maurelii and the other E. Montbeliardii though!

South Plant:


North Plant:

 

I just created a Thread about the Montbeliardii , It look better then the red maurelii , but they look similar .
plus the only reason I`m not sure about ordering one, as I noticed that rare plant are more obvious to be mass product ......3 years ago for a red banana the price was around £25 each , today £2 , My first Musa was £15 for a really tiny plant then £2/3 each .
I was reading an article about the tropical garden is killing the English garden , but be honest the only plant who are surviving the snail red spider and o on are just the tropical.
Just to try , I planted lupin , digitalis, lily and holly (classic cottage flower) all divored by the snails.

 

Kristen - well done with the PDF file.

And many thanks for the kind offer of cuttings. My neighbour has a hardy blue Passion Flower - so my interest would be in a pink or red one, which would have to be kept in a greenhouse. But I have no room. At one time my greenhouse was only full over the winter with tender plants. But its now full all summer as well. And having already two Plumbagos - I can't really justify a third. But thanks all the same.

Bilbo - thats a very good looking red banana. I bought one from Morrisons too, yesterday. I was inspired after seeing that video of how to overwinter them. That Erythrina looks amazing - being from seed. I think it is well worth growing independant of any flowering - so I have added it to my Christmas list.

I am glad the Brug is doing well - it looks very healthy, unlike mine which are badly eaten by slugs.

Kristen - those bananas are superb. I bought a dwarf Cavendish a couple of years ago, which never came back properly after over wintering it. So I am hoping my new one will do better.

 

These are looking more weird than exotic.


The flower of Arisaema tortuosum


I have just noticed the seed from my Arisaema speciosum


Amorphophallus rivieri has just started to emerge. It looks really weird, but beautiful too.

 

I've read that Cavendish needs realtively high min. temperatures so is harder to over winter? and it is dwarf?

Ensete Maurelii and Montbeliardii seem to be incredibly fast growing (mine were 1L plants which arrived at very beginning of April) and thus very rewarding. V. please with them overwintering will be a new experience / challenge though!

If you find your Plumbagos turn out to not be a strong enough Blue let me know and I'll see if I can propagate one for you to try. I posted a thread months ago about getting a decent set (a dozen or so) of Passion flowers. If I do that I'll let folk here know in case anyone fancies a cutting.

 

The old Ferrocactus is flowering again, I seem to have lost the yellow one, it appears to be slowly dieing.