Showing posts with label NF-Blo-Ma. Show all posts
Showing posts with label NF-Blo-Ma. Show all posts
Monday, September 8, 2014
Tuesday, July 1, 2014
Ruby Enough for a Ring?
My Hoya pubicalyx has been blooming since May, but it always do after i left for the big city where i stayed most days. Then finally, last weekend it chose to let me see its splendor. I am so thankful and savored all the pleasure it can give me. One flowering plant has six umbels, while the 2nd plant has 8. That is quite prolific already for a first bloomer and only at its 2nd year of growing. It really is a delightful experience, tending them, looking at them and shooting their pictures.
It looks so elegant individually, do you agree?
Even the umbel is half-full with flowers, an umbel almost 4 inches in diameter.
The flowers kept intact for 7-8 days, at dehiscense the corona are still very stiff.
The two plants that i formed into circles just like wreaths.
Monday, June 16, 2014
Blooms Despite the Long Dry Season
I am already late posting this for GBBD in June, i have the risk that only very few will open my link! But i warn you, all of this you will miss if you will ignore my lateness, haha! Come and let's join appreciating my addiction that someone refers to as a disease. Can you imagine that....a disease! And i can relate to its being very contagious. This disease is very virulent. I warned you, huh!
These are some of my hoya collection. Some are already ongoing bloomers, but most are first timers. So they are really mostly expected and it indeed is very exciting for the buds to bloom. Remember i am living in the big city and go home only about 2 weekends a month, so it is timely if i can see them still open, or already open.
This is one of my two Hoya obscura. This one is more reddish than the other one. Even at this still bud stage, it is already enticing, don't you think so?
This is the fully open flowers of the 2nd Hoya obscura. Don't you think it's perfect!
This Hoya incrassata/crassicaulis has been blooming intermittently for the last 2 years. The umbels are mostly so thick that the habit of the flowers to reflex cannot happen anymore. Those colored corollas remains open showing the brightly colored edges, that make them more amazing and beautiful.
An amazing serendipity also occurred with my 2nd plant of Hoya incrassata/crassicaulis. You might not believe this, but the above plant came from the same mother plant as the former Hoya incrassata/crassicaulis. The latter is purely yellow without the brownish corolla edges. If you ask me why, i can just surmise that this is one of the cases for chimera. It rarely happens, but in ornamentals it is very much favored. Anything unusual or not following the normal patterns are more favored in flowers.
Hoya meliflua is into its first blooming, but there are several umbels that opened either simultaneously or staggeredly. The above one is at the optimum stage of blooming, while that below is already at the more advanced stage.
This is more dull and with less nectar than the previous photo. Insects sipping the nectar are absent also. In 2-3 days the flowers will already abscise.
Above is Hoya pubicalyx. it also has very big umbels compact umbels. Unfortunate of most unfortunates, they are either still closed or already spent when i go home. The lovely thing though is that my niece and nephew send me the blooming photo whenever they open. How wonderful serendipity that can be, and the sent photo to me is below.
This is the Hoya pubicalyx when fully in bloom. I have at 5 plants like this but only 3 are growing peduncles and buds at present. It might already be very common, but its beauty cannot be lessened with that.
This last 3 photos are of Hoya fungii, the two are still closed and the last one already at the height of its fullness. This is the biggest umbel among my blooming hoyas at present. The open stage is around 11 cm.
It doesn't look so big in diameter in this photo, but it left only a small space open near the stem.
Hoya 'Iris Marie', in its 2nd umbel bloom. The first time aborted most of the flowers leaving only two in the umbel. I was not able to see that previous 2 flower blooms, but they sent me the photos. This time it opened exactly the afternoon i just arrived. It was a grand consolation to appease my tiring trip home. And when you come closer, the scent is comparable to a very subtle ladies' perfume, but don't ask me which one, as i think there is none concocted from it yet. I am sure you will love it the moment you smell that fragrance. I assure you, trust me!
There goes my Hoya parade. I hope you can still open my link at GBBD. Please see other posts in that site by Carol at Maydream's Garden.
These are some of my hoya collection. Some are already ongoing bloomers, but most are first timers. So they are really mostly expected and it indeed is very exciting for the buds to bloom. Remember i am living in the big city and go home only about 2 weekends a month, so it is timely if i can see them still open, or already open.
This is just partially open flowers of the top plant. They are so lovely indeed. However, i was not able to wait for them to fully open. I hope i can see that stage next time.
This is my second Hoya obscura. The flowers are more yellow-orange than red compared to the first plant. It is a very prolific bloomer with a lot of umbels per plant. The scent is also overwhelmingly loud, not bad but if lessened a bit will be more irrepressible.
Bees and ants are its common visitors. They cannot resist the fragrance, and when they tasted the nectar, they just opted to stay there. Can you blame them!
There goes my Hoya parade. I hope you can still open my link at GBBD. Please see other posts in that site by Carol at Maydream's Garden.
Monday, April 14, 2014
Heat Tolerant Blooms of April
This marigold is also getting drip shares from the hoyas, and is also shaded by the fruit trees shading them. At least these left over heads will provide some seeds for the next rainy season.
This impatiens is very susceptible to heat. It curls and wilts at noontime, yet watering them again after sunset revives them in a few minutes, and they are turgid again in the morning ready for another hot war! The only caution is not to forget watering every morning and evening, forgetting it once will totally decimate them.
Another diligent bloomer is our Hoya crassicaulis. The plant used a half-coke bottle as its home, you can even see the red bottle cover. It has 6 umbels that never stop blooming, producing new buds again after the blooms dehisce. The half bottle provides a very good humidity control mechanism to the plant. The bottom part is inserted above such that the part with the cover is inside the other half. Can you visualize what i meant. Only the container with plant has small holes, and the cover can be tightened or loosened for the desired water in the media. The drips are also contained in the other bottom half to provide more humidity.
With the performance of this plant, i conclude that my container is a good one for hoya. As a consequence, i am pooling the discarded coke bottles just for this purpose. We are happy and my hoyas are happy too! And to show that this hoya is happy, wait till you see the present characteristics of the flowers. Please see below!
There are so plenty of individual flowers, that didn't allow room for the corolas to recurve back. And all the six umbels showed the same characteristics in this present blooming. It is a very welcome abnormality because the bloom seems different than the real one! What more can i ask for!
Sunday, March 16, 2014
Recycling Works Well
I am sure by now you are maybe already concluding that i am so deep into hoyas! And you are correct. I go home to the province more in a month than i am used to, just because i need to tend to my hoyas. I entrusted them to my sister, who hates them at first, but when they started to flower she is also now watering them with love and caring. My posted photos previous to these are all hoyas too!
The only thing not favorable for me is the hoyas inability to bloom when i am at home. It is very difficult to see them opening during weekends, so most of the time i can only photograph the still closed flower buds, like the one below. But even at this stage it is already alluring, don't you agree?
Hoyas need to have pot-bound roots for more flowers to come out. Sometimes i use recycled plastic bottles as their containers. Are you familiar with the bottle above? I am sure you do because the 1.5 L coke bottles are the best suited for them. The bottle's bottom half is inserted below to collect the leachates from the media during watering. That way a higher humidity is given to them for better growth.
The above umbel is not intentionally placed at that position, it serendipitously flowered there. This hoya knows how to get attention! And this species got my sister hooked.
This is how it looked when the flowers fully opened. Those corollas recurve backwards, leaving the protruding corona fully exposed. Don't you think it is amazing!
Thursday, December 12, 2013
Year-end GBBD!
December is the month when our short-day plants bloom. It is December when the sun is closest to the earth so we get short days, and December 21 is what the earth calls the winter solstice. These plants whose flowering are affected by daylength are called photoperiodic plants. When i was in college I have a little confusion about these plants, because short-day plants are actually those that needed long nights. It is the long nights that trigger them to start flowering and not the short days. So why they are called short-day plants is still a mystery to me. Many commercial plant nurseries take advantage of this capacity to respond to daylength for flowering and treat their plants en masse. This is exemplified by the chrysanthemums, I will not include poinsettias because the mechanism for poinsettias are different.
December daylength doesn't mean the rest of our plants stop blooming during these period. However, the non-photoperiodic ones have been blooming since the start of the rainy season, so they are already mature this time, and some are already preparing for the end of the rainy season, that means start of the dry season. These plants are not anymore at the peak of their flowering beauty. So here they are parading before you, judge them as you please!
These are spray chrysanthemums we just allow growing as a hedge
Chrysanthemum is the only photoperiodic plants we have.
red roses flower continuously during the rainy season, not photoperiodic
a Justicia hybrid whose identity still eludes me
Chrysothemis pulchelia, flowers dwindle already starting to fruit
Odontonema strictum or firespike, also prolific these colder days
a dainty lily whose leaves are variegated, Dianella tasmanica 'Variegata'
Asystasia intrusa
marigolds and Impatiens balsamina
continuously flowering blue Duranta erecta, regardless or season and photoperiod
Alternanthera, white variegated
Alternanthera hybrid
Sanchezia speciosa, fully vegetative during the rainy months, flower at the dry season
Coleus blumei with Marantha at the back
Hoya diversifolia first flowering but with many simultaneous umbels
Hoya crassicaulis first bloom, promising a big umbel
Hoya diversifolia, 2nd plant's first flowering
Tuesday, October 15, 2013
October 2013 GBBD
I missed GBBD last month, but it doesn't mean we don't have blooms in September. As long as we are within the rainy season, we will always see a lot of blooms. Never mind if most of them are orange and red, we are stuck with these warm colors as long as the climate change has not yet drastically changed the world's seasons. We are the tropics, warm and humid. Despite the typhoons visiting us in one season through all the letters of the alphabet, we also get the Inter Tropical Convergent Zone (ITCZ) and Low Pressure Areas (LPA). All of these correspond to a lot of rains, and most frequently floods in some low areas, or landslides in soft steep zones. Fortunately, we live, or our garden is located in a safe place.They are all planted on the ground, mostly untended. Rains are actually advantageous to our plants. As long as they are happy, i am happy too.
This Hippeastrum flowered for the first time with one bulb having two scapes and one scape having 3 blooms. Isn't it great.
Even my Hoya diversifolia flowered for the first time, in less than a year from planting. Can you see the 3rd level of immature flowers under the 2nd growth. I'd like to tell you that the 3 nodes above this are carrying immature flowers too. It's not very busy eh!
The Ixora provides a good nectar source for butterflies, they really love it, and loved also by the photographer because the butterfly just transfer its proboscis from one flower to the next in the same umbel. I can focus and shoot when they stay at one place.
This golden duranta hedge is overpowered by the invasive Asystasia intrusa; bougainvillea is relegated to the side, while the tall Cycas serve as the green background. This Asystasia is truly living its name!
This is just one plant of the blue Duranta repens (erecta), but it produced lots of new growths and flowers after pruning. This is a favorite of the butterflies and they normally converge here.
Dracaena fruticosa is a very tough plant, which can stay long indoors too. This is planted in a rocky surface yet doesn't complain, still produce lots of flowers like firecrackers which eventually will become orange berries resembling Christmas lights.
This tree Lantana has been here for more than 10 years, i don't totally remove it because of the butterflies. It already has a 1 inch diameter trunk.
Chrysothemis pulchella is at its best during the rainy season, dwindling or dormant at dry months
Odontonema strictum loves the rainy season too, but not very happy under shade
Anthurium andreanum shows its lush growth too, evidenced by the bright spathe, this is pale pink in the dry months.
This zinnia has been blooming for almost a year now, it might dry during the next months.
This is a lily I haven't yet searched well for the proper ID, but it is also dormant during the dry season
Butterflies bloom when flowers abound
Hedychium coronarium provides a nice scent for the garden, reaching around a few meter radius when the wind blows, it provides a good lingering scent while i am having coffee in the terrace, while the birds are eating the fruits in the nearby tree.
This Impatiens walleriana is planted in that cracked plastic basin, recycling to the max! I guess the basin will have a long service life this way.
I always cut this Sanchezia speciosa leaving only a foot at the base, and it always give this luxuriously healthy growth afterwards. It flowers during the dry season, so prunning is annually.
Lastly, even the white mushrooms are blooming during the rainy season. We still have a lot of blooms, but i ommitted some because there's already a lot of photos in this post. Maybe i will reserve the rest for next month, because some of these here are already getting old and might not be nice anymore for the next GBBD.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)