Tropicalismo!

 

Not usually into posting about the plantings on hotel grounds and resorts (bar exceptional ones like those found in Madeiran and Cornish hotels) as they tend to be formulaic and regimented. But going through our photos on our recent trip to Vietnam I couldn't help but long to be transported back to where we stayed, especially seeing once again the lush tropical planting they had there.

View from our balcony

Read More

Plants in the Blue Pots Update

Funny how a post, like this one can have several working titles. The first one was 'Front of House Plants Update' but it was the exact title we used we we first gave an update last July. Then the second one was 'As I Weed at the Front of the House' but thought...nah! So went with the third.

So how are the plants in blue pots at the front of our house doing? Generally very good. A few changes since July but everytihng that is there now, except for one more recent addition has sailed through last winter fine with no extra protection at all. Being at the front of the house they must be tough enough to not need any protecting during the winter but at the same time reap benefits from what is perhaps the most sheltered outdoor spot in our property (south facing, gets winter sun, and gets radiant warmth from the paving and house bricks).

Read More

The Tropical Dream

Given the opportunity, would you want to live in the tropics? Not just for a few weeks or months but actually move, take residence, and live there permanently.

Would you?

Where it's warm and humid all year round with no winter to contend with. Where you can potentially garden all year round.

Has the tropical dream ever crossed your mind?

Had a wonderful holiday in a tropical location before and would love to live there or somewhere similar one day?

Southeast Asia, Central and Southern America, Africa, India, Northern Australia, The Pacific Islands. The Caribbean....

Having an exotic and tropical inspired garden, we get asked this all the time, especially me, if we want to or would move eventually to the tropics. It's a question that I personally find tricky to answer but before I even start to answer often I would hear the one who asked me say first...

Wouldn't it be nice to live in the tropics?

I would love to live in the tropics one day. 

I would move to the tropics if it was easy/possible (and variations thereof...)

Really? 

Now I'm curious, given the chance and practicalities aside, if it were to be easy, would you want to live in the tropics?

Mark :-)

Read More

In Praise of the Humble Trachycarpus

What would an exotic garden in the UK be without the humble Trachycarpus fortunei?

The wonderful and hardy palm, Trachycarpus fortunei

First of all, using the word humble to describe this palm is already doing it a disservice as it is actually a tall growing, potentially imposing, stately, and a very architectural palm.

However, it is also usually maligned for being so 'common'. And being maligned makes it humbled which is very unfair.

There are different types of Trachycarpus palms out there with T. fortunei being the hardiest and most popular and T. wagnerianus a very close second on both aspects. This photo was taken at the Palm House Nursery in Devon, a nursery specialising in T. wagnerianus

So what's not to like about this palm when it is:

As stated above: tall growing, stately, and very architectural.

Hardy for most parts of the UK

Hardy for most parts of the UK

Relatively fast growing for a palm, more than a foot a year is possible once it is established on the ground, slower when in a pot.

Fancy a different look? When it is tall enough you can strip its trunk from its fibrous covering

Evergreen

Leafy and very exotic looking. Equally at home to jungle, xeric, and Mediterranean style of garden.

It's a jungle out there!

Solitary trunk. Once it has gained a significant size of trunk and the crown is well above ground you regain precious garden space beneath it for layering and under planting. Or just leave it as it is for a minimalist look.

It can be dug up with just a small rootball left and yet survive and transplant successfully into a new location. It will sulk for a year or two of course but afterwards it will carry on growing as usual.

Will grow happily either in full sun or shade and anything else in between. 

Drought tolerant (except in pots) but does appreciate and perform much better when watered generously and fertilised during the growing season.

Severely scorched by flames but it carried on producing new growth as normal

Provides a very good backbone and structure to a garden.

Easy, undemanding, reliable.

However, it's own good merits are also the very reason it is often maligned by other exoticists. By being so easy, undemanding, and reliable it is readily available hence 'common'. And by being common, snobbery comes into place by others.

Personally I am so glad, thankful, and appreciative for the existence of this palm and all of its good merits. It's easy enough to focus on what's not existing out there (like a reliably hardy feather palm for a start) but I can't imagine if this palm did not exist at all!

It is of course possible to have an exotic garden in the UK without any palm in it. Or even a palm based garden with only a few or no Trachycarpus fortunei in it at all. But you'll have to be in one of the few milder areas in the UK, or have an exceptionally good microclimate, or do loads of protective measures during the winter.

Whenever we visit nurseries it's funny how we still gravitate towards this palm whether it is surrounded by other exotics or not. We don't always buy them of course but good sized ones for a good price the temptation gets very high and resistance becomes weak, just like when we recently went to the Palm Centre.

Bargain Trachycarpus fortunei

Sometimes I wander down the garden, looking out for some of our rarer and more unusual plants and thinking of writing a blog post about them. Often I get on such a mindset that I overlook some of our reliable stalwarts, like this palm when they really deserve as much focus as some of the rarer ones. So here I am singing praises for this wonderful palm, a plant we couldn't be without in our exotic garden.

What about you, any plant in particular that is 'common' and yet you couldn't be without in your garden?

Mark :-)

Read More

NYBG Conservatory - Rainforest and Aquatic Plants

We finally had the chance to start sorting out the photos we took of our visit to New York Botanical Gardens last September and one of the highlights of which was our wander through the different sections of the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory.

This conservatory, a major landmark and considered to be the crown jewel of New York City houses the tender plant collection of the botanical gardens. The building itself was inspired from the Palm House at Kew Gardens as well as the Crystal Palace (which was destroyed in 1936 and was never rebuilt). The conservatory fell into disrepair in the 70's and needed some much needed major restoration which was then made possible by the generous donation of Enid A. Haupt, hence the conservatory being named after her once all restoration work was completed.

Read More

Kindness Through Ginkgos

Just a few days after the fire in our garden, imagine my astonishment when one of the builders summoned me from upstairs telling me that there is a delivery of plants waiting for me downstairs. 

Read More

April in the Garden

This year Spring has been quite late in the UK and across much of Europe, with a long cold snap through February and March. However April is now showing some warmer and brighter weather and the garden is responding rapidly.

I love this time of year, with new shoots and leaves on woody plants, and herbaceous plants busting through the soil ready to explode into new and exciting forms that we have not seen since last autumn.

I took a stroll round the garden this evening with a camera in hand, here are some of the plants that caught my attention.

Read More

Book Review: The Encyclopedia Of Cultivated Palms

The first edition was originally published back in 2003 and ever since The Encyclopedia of Cultivated Palms has been a key reference text for all palm enthusiasts.  This much anticipated update includes an additional author and well known palm expert Scott Zona, curator of the Wertheim Conservatory in Florida and also includes a significant number of palm species and varieties that have been  introduced into cultivation since the original edition was published.

There are 825 species of palm described in detail, including key information for us on cold hardiness, water needs, height, and any other special requirements. Each palm is well illustrated, with almost 1,000 colour photographs in the book in total.

Our own interest is particularly focused on those palms available within the UK for example, Trachycarpus and Brahea are well represented with each having 8 species listed and described. Butia, Chamaedorea and Syagrus fair even better with 9, 43 and 24 species discussed respectively. Some of the very new introductions are omitted but clearly the botanic world can be quite fast moving and so any encylopedia will need regular revision and updates to include everything.

Many will be familiar with the revised naming convention that was proposed in 2010 for the Butia family, the new names are used in the book and are well explained, in particular how the name impacts on the popular Butia odorata (formerly Butia capitata).

After an initial introduction to palms, the book contains two main sections, the first of which deals with the photographs, The Gallery of Palms has 250 pages containing in excess of 900 colour photographs, many of which tease and delight in equal measure. Sadly many remind us how far north and cold we are in the UK and thus we can only admire many of the wonderful plants from afar or within the protected environs of places such as The Palm House at Kew.

Following on from the photo gallery comes the second and significantly larger section of the book which contains an alphabetical listing of the palms starting with Acanthophoenix and covering the 825 species through to Zombia. The individual entries each give an overview of the family with an introduction to the genus, followed by a more detailed discussion and explanation  of the individual species characteristics, including typical traits and growing conditions needed as well as seed form and germination techniques.

The final part of the book lists palms by  a number of categories, assisting those looking to select a palm for a specific aspect, for example drought tolerance or speed of growth, perhaps this section may be less useful for those growing palms in the UK as most will have to be grown under glass due to the colder climate.

For those of us growing palms in the UK we often have to deal with pests or overwintering plants in doors, the book doesn't cover pests and treatments or the suitability of a plant to spending time as a house plant. However this book is great value for money and a must have read for anyone interested in growing, identifying or simply enjoying palms. Highly recommended.

The Encyclopedia Of Cultivated Palms is published by Timber Press and available from all the usual outlets.

Read More

Succulent Survivors

I was meaning to remove and tidy these pots of succulents over the weekend but some of them look like they are still alive...

Sole survivor....if this tiny cluster lives and sails through winter, it's definitely going to be saved (and re-rooted!)

All of them were excess spare plants that I had used for a summer display but instead of removing them in the autumn, I opted to keep them out as they would remain looking good until the first hard frosts and freezes hit them (or kill them rather), after which I could tidy them up. So far they have stayed good right until early December when we experienced temperatures that dipped down to -6C. Once they had defrosted the damage gradually became more visible.

Haworthia attenuata, Graptoveria, and Echeveria runyonii 'Topsy Turvy'

Agave parryi var. truncata, Agave victoriae-reginae, Kalachoe tomentosa

So it was just a matter of taking the time to remove them at any point afterwards but when I saw that some are showing signs of survival, I opted to delay their removal until much later on to see which ones may actually sail through the winter. It's going to be my mini experiment.

Despite looking intact some of them are definitely dead like the Haworthia attenuata and Graptoveria, whilst the Kalanchoe tomentosa are neither intact nor alive, it is well and truly mushed. The Agave lophantha I was a little surprised with, although I wasn't expecting it to be that hardy, a relatively short cold snap has caused it so much damage.

Agave lophantha

As for the others: a very small Agave victoriae-reginae, alive but severely damaged; Agave scabra which only has a few marks; Echeveria runyonii 'Topsy Turvy' with the outer leaves mushed but the centre looks intact; and a supposedly Agave parryi var. truncata, the star performer of the lot and is very promising for despite its small size it looks virtually untouched by the cold weather.

This tiny Agave parryi var. truncata is telling me something (that it's tougher than it looks and wants to stay..)

Agave scabra

The Echeveria 'Topsy Turvy' is one of the hardier echeverias around and we used to have a patch of it, thriving and spreading out on a sunny and gravelled part of our garden and was never given any extra protection during winter. Alas winter 2010-11 was a very harsh one and it was only then that they perished. So it wasn't much of a surprise that this one on the dish is still looking mostly fine. I just hope the temps don't get any colder than it has been this winter already.

Echeveria runyonii 'Topsy Turvy'

For now I'm leaving them all as it is and will wait and see what they will be like come spring. All survivors will definitely be kept then, for they would have proven they are definitely worth keeping!

Mark :-)

Read More

Deserts and Arid, History of Plants - Jardin des Plantes

Here's the second in the series of blog posts regarding the glasshouses at Jardin des Plantes in Paris.

The biggest section of the glasshouses are the plants from the humid tropics and the remaining three sections are much smaller yet still packed with several interesting plants. The arid section is on the same glasshouse as where the humid tropical section is but it along a narrow section that connects the front to back parts of the structure.

It is more like a Desert and Arid corridor...

A skinny Desert and Arid section with a modest selection of xerophytes

Mixed arid plants with overly prominent tags.

Agave filifera (is it about to flower??)

Agave desmettiana

Agave parrasana

That's a bit better!

We loved the form of this Opuntia microdasys

A wide selection of barrel cactus, again the display could have been more engaging to the visitor.

Sulcorebutia steinbachii var. gracilior - tongue twister of a name but I really like this one!

Agave tequilana (?)

We whizzed through this section and just took photos as we passed by, not just because it was comparatively small but also it still lacked the impact of planting as what you'd normally expect in glasshouse specimens. Perhaps this section is newly planted and the plants haven't grown or settled in yet? Newly planted or not they could do with more plants in this area or re-think the planting altogether for more impact.

After passing by this 'dry and white' corridor you go back into the humid tropical section where there is a passageway to get to the New Caledonia section (more of this on the third and final instalment). The last part, which was oddly not connected by glass walkway and is separate from the rest is the History of Plants (Evolution) glasshouse. Small selections of lichens, horsetails, ferns, conifers, and cycads are to be found there, arranged in a way to demonstrate their timeline of appearance on the face of the earth. This section is interesting enough for a ten minute amble. Curiously, this part has a security guard...

The primitive genus that is Equisetum

...and the delicate and fern-like beauty of Selaginella, the spikemosses

Blechnum brasiliense

Fossilised tree trunk

It may be winter outside but it's only autumn inside the glasshouse - Ginkgo biloba leaves

Encephalartos lehmannii

A large Podocarpus salignus at the back

Cyathea robusta

More Equisetum (I wonder if this was deliberate or just spread around...)

Quite a contrast of a post, from dry to moist and lush! On the next and final instalment will be a short yet very interesting glimpse of the plants from New Caledonia.

Mark :-)

Read More