Blue Irises and Egyptian Starclusters

Blue Irises and Egyptian Star clusters

The thing about photographing flowers is that some of them unfortunately are only open for a short period of time or open and close during specific hours as is the case with Four O’clock (Mirabilis jalapa). This can lead to some disappointments not to mention missed photo opportunities if you do not have a camera at hand or come back later only to find that later was too late.


I have planted Blue Irises (Neomarica caerulea) in several locations at Malifa and Alafua. The thing with these flowers is that very saddly they are one day wonders. I saw one of them had flowered a few days ago and thought to myself that I should take a photo but as I was busy I decided to leave it till later. Unfortunately when I came back all I saw was the closed up flower already withering on the plant.

Fortunately I noticed that one of the other clumps had two buds developing so I have been checking them regularly. Today I was lucky as I had completely forgotten but was making cutting of some hibiscus and Pua taunofo among other plants when I was in the area where they are and remembered to check (since they are actually a bit obscured by some other plants) and there they were. This time I only briefly considered leaving the photos till latter but quickly changed my mind and hurried off to wash my hands and get my camera.

 

UNKNOWN

 

Torch Ginger (Etlingera elatior)

 

Egyptian Starclusters (Pentas lanceolata)

 

Egyptian Starclusters (Pentas lanceolata)

 

Flora and Fauna - Plants and Critters Blog by Vincent Albert Vermeulen is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

Based on a work at http://plantsandcritters.blogspot.be/.

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Additional information:

Here is a list of my blogs:

·         Flora and Fauna - Plants and Critters (on plants, animals as well as gardening, conservation and environmental matters): http://plantsandcritters.blogspot.com/

·         The Blood of  Souls (language, translation and etymology) : http://thebloodofsouls.blogspot.com/

·         Whiskers on Kittens (Life with Kittens and Cats in general) : http://whiskersonkittens-vincent.blogspot.com/

Hurricane Evan Part 2: The Aftermath

Hurricane Evan Part 2: The Aftermath

The Hurricane did tons of damage. The rivers and creeks overflowed and washed away homes and everything in their paths and flooded ...

Our property at Malifa had several meters of property washed away. Luckily the trees and plants I had planted mimimised the loss. After the Hurricane I could not help noticing how the root systems of the avocado trees, Indonesian Wax Roses and Torch Gingers could be seen holding the remaining embankment together. These avocado trees that certain people had criticised me for planting. Interestingly and sadly I could not help wondering how much more would have been saved had the breadfruit trees and Fuafua trees that had been chopped down had  been retained.

 

 

 

It never ceases to amaze and infuriate me how despite all the talk of not cutting trees along waterways and all the programmes and blah blah about how important these and plants growing along the waterways are in preventing soil erosion etc ... people still have this demented urge to cut trees down and clear land on the banks of waterways.

I know grass is a plant but the root systems of lawns will do very little to prevent erosion. As for cutting down sickly or unsightly trees or trees that are too big and pose a danger in high winds; that is fine as long as you replace them with another tree. Actually my preference is for the rule of planting at least two trees for every tree you cut down.

Unfortunately here in Samoa there is this insane mania for cutting down trees and either not replacing them or replacing them with what I call excuses for trees.

Torch Gingers before Cyclone Evan (Malifa)

 Torch gingers after Cyclone Evan (Malifa)

Yet even with all the death and destruction caused by the cyclone nature is resuming its activity and there are some startling moments of surreal beauty all the more stunning because of the stark contrast between the destruction and devastation surrounding you.

 

The only good thing about the hurricane is that all that rain has the zepheranthes all popping up with flower buds. Mind you it is possible that this would have happened anyway as it is the rainy season although the sudden emergence of so many buds where previously there were none is astonishing. Maybe I did not really notice them when I looked a few days before the hurricane but I am sure I would have noticed because I do recall seeing a handful here and there and mentally rubbing my hands thinking of all the seeds I would have once they flower are pollinated and seed.

Photo of Zepheranthes flower buds

But now its a totally different story as there are a multitude of buds and the seed load will be exponentially bountiful indeed.

Here are some pictures of all the flower buds practically bursting to flower.

Flora and Fauna - Plants and Critters Blog by Vincent Albert Vermeulen is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

Based on a work at http://plantsandcritters.blogspot.be/.

Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at http://plantsandcritters.blogspot.be/.

 Facts:

Cyclone Evan struck the Samoan archipelago on 13 December 2012. It was rated as Tropical Cyclone Category 4.
The Samoan archipelago is comprised of the Independent State of Samoa and the American Territory of American Samoa.

Additional information:

Here my current blogs:

·         Flora and Fauna - Plants and Critters (on plants, animals as well as gardening, conservation and environmental matters): http://plantsandcritters.blogspot.com/

·         The Blood of  Souls (language, translation and etymology) : http://thebloodofsouls.blogspot.com/

·         Whiskers on Kittens (Life with Kittens and Cats in general) : http://whiskersonkittens-vincent.blogspot.com/

 

 

 

Planting a Purple Hedge

I have been plating a hedge at the house at Malifa on the side facing the road. I choose a purplish black leafy hedge plant for a couple of reasons. First it is unusual as most people have hibiscus hedges while others have variegated (green and yellow) leafed hedges. Two it has nice white flowers with little bits of purple in them. I plan on having a second layer with yellow/green variegated leaves. Actually it is not exactly the plant I wanted. I have seen one which is a deep purple. This one ranges from green (in the shade) to black and purplish balck in the full sun.

I started with some cuttings that I transplanted once they had established roots. Then when these grew I waited until I was able to make more cuttings from these. Hoping that no "overly clever and enthusiastic" person decided to "trim" the hedge. I needed woody stems so it has taken a while. But as long as it is woody I can use it. At first I was using pieces from 6 - 8 inches long and sticking them into poly bags fileld with river silt which I have found to be the best medium for rooting cuttings. then I tried to see if I could get more cuttings from each woody stem. So I cut 1 - 2 inch bits making sure that each piece had at least one set of leaves. I used cell trays insead of poly bags since the plantlets were much smaller and that also saved on space. It worked.

Once these had nice healthy roots systems I dug a trench and transplanted them extending the bit of hedge on both sides. Colin and Leatuse helped me with this. Recently we transplanted another stretch and started some more cuttings. As you can see they are green since they were in a shady area.

One major drawback of this plant and one other variety of variegated (green/yellow) hedge plants is that it appears to be the favourite food of one of the butterfly species here. I’m not sure which one. They have BIG fat black furry caterpillars with green and blue stripes with voracious appetites.

In the foreground you can see the Torch gingers that were planted as a secondary screen as well as for the stunning and large flowers they produce. Fully grown the stalks will be about 10 feet tall. I intend the hedge infront to be atleast 6 feet tall to block out the noise and dust from Vailima road as well as provide some privacy.

These were planted from suckers about a month ago. As you can see they already have suckers coming up. These were suckers from a couple suckers that I had planted a few months before that which are to the left as well as one sucker from the original stand that I planted at the back of the house over looking the river (creek). The soil on this part of the property is very sand which is strange but may have been where they dumped sand when building the house. Anyway the soft sandy soil seems to help the plants grow suckers a lot faster. Here you can see the ones I planted a few months ago. The grassless exposed area used to have a covering of bread fruit leaves which I had started with the triple purpouse of compost, mulch and to kill the sensitive grass (Mimosa pudica )that was starting to grow there.

Then certain individuals removed all the leaves. After I explained the reason the leaves were there they started putting some back. The only useful outcome of this is that you can now see the extent of the sucker development. There is also one rather anaemic looking flower stalk emerging. Well plants can be anaemic but its a rather apt description for this poor little thing. Maybe its because of too much direct sun? The others are all semi shaded.

I only hope that with the removal of the moist leave cover that the young plants are not adversly affected. soon they will be covered up again so hopefully it will not be a problem.

Checking up on Torch Gingers

Went by Malifa yesterday to check up on the plants, water them and see how things were going.
The Torch Ginger's (Etlingera elatior) at the back overlooking the river. Well ok ... we call it a river in Samoa but in reality its a creek that runs dry during the dry season.

Anyway the Torch Ginger was doing ok. There was only one flower in its early stages. There were also quite a few suckers that could easily be removed for transplanting. I will do that when renovations at the house at Alafua are complete and I move there. They will require careful watering after transplanting. The only way I can be sure that this will happen is if I am there to do it. I will be transplanting a whole bunch of other plants there too including some blue irises.

The yellow rattlesnake plants (Calathea crotalifera) I planted next to the water tank have really grown alot in a year and need to be thinned out. The only problem is that doing this is not that easy because the soil there is very rocky and digging them out and cutting the rizhomes loose is hard and frustrating work.

Last time I took some I ended up pretty much destroying half of what I cut loose. I planted some between us and the neighbours to create a barrier against their dogs and two of the 5 plants that I planted took. The others kept getting uprooted by the dogs. Here are the two survivors.

Unfortunately my sister did some "cleaning up" along the boarder between us and the neighbours mainly to get rid of the annoying fue that grows over everything and as usual ... cleared other things as well. Typical Samoan style clearing as in cut everything down INCLUDING the two plants that had survived and were begining to grow quite well. They grow close together and very thickly and would have eventually developed into an inpenetratable barrier against the dogs. Now ... well ... I dont know. The roots are still in the ground at least so hopefully they will recover and send up shoots.
Here is a before picture I took a few days before to show how well they had recovered and were growing.

An interesting fact about these plants is that they are part of the Marantaceae or arrowroot family which is also known as the prayer plant family. the reason for this name is that in the evening their leaves fold up as if in prayer. Then in the morning they spread open again. These are not the bright yellow I have seen elsewhere. I have one small clump of brownish ones which I planted far far away because it appears to have some sort of leave infestation which has not cleared up.

Another plant that has had set back due to people indicrimitaley chopping them down or cutting back their leaves are the giant helliconias on one side of the property.

I think these are Helliconia caribaea "Jaqcuini". Well I think it is Helliconia caribaea Jaqcuini it looks alot like this one which that say is Helliconia caribaea Jaqcuini. There is also of stand of pale yellow ones.
What I find frustrating is that no matter how often I explain to some people that you need to just let the plants grow and that if you keep "trimming" them they will not flower. Also I planted them to act as a screen / barrier and provide shade. Once they attain their full growth then the will provide shade and still let breezes through which will be cooled by the shade. Geeze its simple physics ok thermodynamics but still ... I don't understand why it is so complicated for anyone. All you need to do is take note the difference between a breeze that flows through a well shaded area and one that does not pass through any shade.
It never ceases to amaze me that when its blazing hot and people are outside they gravitate to shade trees and YET even though they have used those shade trees they will still go ahead and chop them down or "prune" them within an inch of their lives and then complain  about how hot it is.
Sorry tree killers are one of my major sources of headaches.

Anyway some Zephyranthes that were transplanted a month or so ago have obviously recovered and are growing well. You can see them at the bottom right. An earlier group in the centre just before  the purple grown orchids have been happliy multiplying and flower every now and them. When the whole lot flower it looks fantastic. these are the pink ones which grow the best being resistant to African Snails (Achatina fulica) and grow well by dividing as well as seed.

I have some white ones which only grow by dividind and slowly at that. Very very slowly although I am planning on some experiments with different soils to see if that has any effect. I'd say the pink zepheranthes multiply 4-5 times faster. As for the yellow ones ... well I'm nursing the few I have along hoping to get more. Of course the fact that the African Snails so obviously love them is a problem that I am going to have to resolve.

Rain Lillies and Torch Gingers

Here is a photo of some Zephyranthes that were flowering in front of the house I am staying in at Fagalii (Samoa). I also got some from Alberts Peter's place Samoana Nursery at Aleisa ... wow almost two years ago. Now I have tons and tons of them. I have been planting pink ones at the back of the place I am staying at Fagalii as well as at my parent's place at Malifa and will be planting many at Alafua also. I have lots of pots of pink Zepheranthes that need to be transplanted. They are getting cramped in the pots I have them in at the moment although I have already divided some up and transplanted them into other pots.
They grow pretty well. Once they have recovered from being pulled up, divided and transplanted they grow and start to multiply. They also produce viable seeds. So whenever they flower I am out making sure all the flowers are pollinated even though that means the flowers do not last as long.
For some reason the white ones do not produce seeds. I suspect they are a hybrid because apparently some of the hybrids have this problem.
The yellow ones produce seeds but I do not have any in the ground because the African Snails go for them. Albert Peters had the same problem with his at Aleisa. the ones I bought were rather ... raggedly already. At the moment the only yellow ones I have are some I got from seeds from the ones I bought from Peters. The parent plants unfortunately got munched soon after.
The new lot are still seedings and are coming along so slowly compared to the pinks. Between the African Snails and the stupid cat sleeping on them its a wonder they are still alive.

This is a Torch Ginger the scientific name is Etlingera elatior. They belong to the Zingiberales Order and the Zingiberaceae Family.

I planted a stand at the back of the house at Malifa. I got the suckers from Tanumalala which is on the crest of the mountain ridge on your way to Lefaga. From this single stand I have been able to get suckers to start 8 more stands five of which are producing lots of little suckers already. I think that the reason that the newest ones are producing suckers so quickly is because they are in soil that is loose and sandy which probably makes it easier for the suckers to come up. At least that is my theory. The original stand is in hard soil that is full of rocks. Getting the suckers off that was hard. I basically had to dig all the soil away using a bush knife and gardening trowel before I could cut the suckers free.
With the ones in the sandy soil I just stuck the bush knife in the ground estimating where the connetion was and that was it.
The fully grown branches are about 10 feet tall ... maybe more. I'm going to growing a stip of stands behind the hedge I am growing along the road and maybe another bunch along the boarder between us and the neighbours. But I have already started growing some rattle snake plants there because they grow tightly together and that will be an excellent barrier against their dogs once they get established.

The flowers of the Torch Ginger are excellent for cut flower arrangements because they last for a long time. Also you an cut them early or leave them to grow bigger for different sizes.

This is a mediumish sized flower. I have seen ones twice this size. Personally I think the little one and the medium ones look better.