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Post by bixaorellana on May 24, 2009 15:52:37 GMT
Ha, Spindrift! That so much reminds me of an English friend of mine in New Orleans. She said people in there spent so much time bemoaning the difficulty of having nice roses, calendula, tulips, etc. -- in other words, plantings reminiscent of England & cooler climates. She pointed out that in NO one could grow wonderful hibiscus and other things that give a rampant tropical look -- things that English gardeners grind their teeth over not having.
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Post by Deleted on May 24, 2009 15:56:03 GMT
Kerouac, was it the norm for you to keep the privet clipped? Up north it is so compulsory to have one's privet hedges clipped. Peter Matthiessen's property is the only one I know of that got away with letting his go and even then it was frowned upon. Miles and miles of hedgerows clipped to "perfection". Yes, we kept it trimmed, but not to perfection. The invention of electric hedge clippers was a godsend.
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Post by spindrift on May 24, 2009 16:13:15 GMT
With flowers and shrubs - so with life...we always want what we can't have
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Post by Deleted on May 24, 2009 16:21:19 GMT
I did not know that privet and ligustrum(what it is called in NOLA) were even the same plant until after I moved here because I had never seen it in bloom. It's very unusual to see it trimmed here. The hedges up north keep many,many laborers employed in season.
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Post by Deleted on May 30, 2009 20:23:34 GMT
Today I was admiring a small 'dump center' in my neighborhood. It's one of those places where you take bigger items that the normal garbage service is not supposed to pick up, either because it is too big or because it contains something toxic.
They put it in a fenced area under a section of the elevated subway, but to hide the ugliness from view, they have planted some vines and bamboo along the fence. It hasn't been there very long, but I am amazed at how much the vines have grown on the fence in such a short time.
I don't know what the plant is, but I'll try to take some photos soon and maybe somebody can identify it.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 2, 2009 0:02:19 GMT
my all time favorite,still blooming. Antigonon leptopus,'Alba' I do not know what this is. A fence down the street is covered in it. Intriguing.
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Post by imec on Nov 2, 2009 3:39:09 GMT
Wow! I'd like a fence covered in that - really beautiful. The shape of the bloom is so odd...
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Post by Deleted on Nov 2, 2009 14:18:13 GMT
I think it is a variety of Vigna Caracalla,'corkscrew vine'.
I have fallen in love with vines before and planted whole fence rows of them in the past. After a while though (as with wallpaper) I get bored with and they lose their original appeal,particularly if it is a long lived vine. I now choose to grow only one or two intermingled with other things that can be seasonally swapped out. If anything,different textures of foliage and different sized blooms with compatible color schemes.
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Post by happytraveller on Nov 2, 2009 14:23:44 GMT
Wow, Casimira, the second picture is absolutely stunning !
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Post by Deleted on Nov 2, 2009 14:28:34 GMT
Thanks HT! I suspect you have a secret talent for gardening in you.(Like you don't have enough to do!). (modified because I posted HW instead of HT! sorry Happy! )
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Post by Deleted on Nov 2, 2009 20:51:34 GMT
Nice photos, I love the way you've captured all the little details. Really good.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 2, 2009 21:55:31 GMT
thanks d.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 6, 2009 12:25:45 GMT
Solanum jasminoides,Potato Vine,Virgin's Bower A prolific bloomer,Nightshade family.(note how blooms resemble Eggplant or Aubergine)
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Post by imec on Nov 6, 2009 13:05:55 GMT
All this stuff is still in bloom cas? Maybe we should add another category to the "those who have it easy" poll - those that live in warm climes... Just beautiful!
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Post by Deleted on Nov 6, 2009 13:49:22 GMT
Yes imec,I'm afraid so...all these pictures I've posted of flowers were taken by me in the last two weeks. Many of them bloom almost year round with most peaking in September/October. We had an unusually warm last week 2 weeks of October.
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Post by spindrift on Nov 6, 2009 13:52:55 GMT
What a lovely climate.
Casimira - it took me a long time to find my white Solanum...plenty of the blueish ones around here.
I'm told that solanum propagates easily from cuttings? would you agree with this?
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Post by Deleted on Nov 6, 2009 14:09:35 GMT
The solanum here volunteer prolifically from the berries that drop everywhere so no need to do cuttings here. I would suggest though, taking a piece of stem that's a little woody with some green still in evidence(,so,not too old,not too new)and potting that up with some rooting hormone on the tip. Keep evenly moist but not too.Or,saving some of the berries and try planting them in spring there.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 20, 2009 19:11:47 GMT
The ivy creeping up the attic wall to the window stopped all indication of being alive about a month and a half ago. It has not withered, it has not changed color, it just stopped doing anything. That is fine with me, as long as it stays that way until spring. I give it just a bit of water and keep my fingers crossed. If I'm lucky, when spring comes around again, it will put out new tendrils and leaves and continue to spread with exuberance. I really hope that it will happen, because I have the impression that it is a plastic plant at the moment.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 24, 2009 0:32:07 GMT
Clerodendrum thomsoniae,an all red "Bleedingheart",hummingbirds go crazy over
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Post by Deleted on Apr 1, 2010 17:01:09 GMT
I smelled it before I saw it. Riding my bicycle this morning,nearly fell over...jeez,and there she was. Wisteria,in all her glory. (there's a climbing rose woven in her,I think it's "Old Blush")
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Post by Jazz on Apr 1, 2010 20:09:39 GMT
Your wisteria is lush and beautiful! It's very difficult to grow wisteria here.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 2, 2010 10:49:57 GMT
Your wisteria is lush and beautiful! It's very difficult to grow wisteria here. Given the size these guys get,I cannot have in my garden. But,I enjoy seeing them all over town this time of year growing as you see with great abandon. Pity they don't grow there,I'm surprised somehow because they do grow prolifically up in New England. Here is the Solanum jasminoides,'alba' that Spindrift is so fond of,I spotted it yesterday on a neighbor's fence:
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Post by bixaorellana on Apr 2, 2010 15:57:05 GMT
That is a really magnificent wisteria, and having the rose woven into puts it into the glorious standard of beauty.
Jazz, in parts of the US south people avoid planting wisteria because of its prolific strength. It has been known to bend the iron of a supporting fence. It looks as though someone managed to train the one in Casimira's photo up a cable to the phone pole.
When I lived in Wilmington, North Carolina, the wisteria in the outer environs of the city was amazing in bloom. The trees tightly lining the sides of the roads would have blooming wisteria all the way to their crowns.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 4, 2010 17:04:06 GMT
Yes, in south Mississippi, wisteria was used with great caution and never against a house. But it really does look great when it is in full glory. The wisteria in France never looks that lush.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 4, 2010 17:10:40 GMT
I'm waiting for the climbing roses and climbing other things to get going before I make my report on the 'Promenade Plantée' in Paris. It's a linear garden along an old railway line.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 12, 2010 1:57:34 GMT
This vine is the bane of my existence. Beautiful blooms yes. However,will, and is ,smothering everything it can get it's nasty tendrils onto. (Note,how it is smothering a pine tree and a Japanese Magnolia in this photo!) It puts out seed pods that are like mile long vanilla beans,each containing hundreds of seeds that will and do blow everywhere and sprout. It laughed at the hard freeze that killed just about everything.
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Post by gertie on Apr 13, 2010 3:56:04 GMT
Wisteria will smother and will take a house apart. My grandparents had one by their house and it will suddenly sprout up at the end of a root, which happened to them and it was taking a wall apart before they even realized hardly it was there.
casimira, that second one, the passion flower, I was reading somewhere some of them have edible parts, don't recall if it was seeds or what. I've always thought those flowers were so amazing, like truth stranger than fiction.
Also, the thing with the white and purple flowers up there, are you sure it isn't sweet pea? I see where the corkscrew reference came from, but my first thought on looking was "Sweet pea". Perhaps if it isn't sweet pea, they are related.
I used to love the orange trumpet vine, til I moved into this house. Evidently someone planted it along the fence row and I have to prune it back every year as it hangs so heavy on our little fence, plus all the dead bits. It has also run over a tree against the fence on the neighbor's side so thickly it seems as though it confuses the tree, or strangles it, or something. It is always the last to get leaves. It is still terribly pretty and I love watching the bees working while I drink coffee in the mornings.
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Post by bixaorellana on Apr 13, 2010 5:27:32 GMT
Yeeeeeek ~~ the extremely beautiful and totally destructive cat's claw! That's a constant source of conversation in New Orleans -- the extreme measures people have gone to trying to eradicate it, always ending in failure: "And then, after putting the used motor oil on it, we poured a concrete slab ..."
Gertie, many of the passion flowers yield edible fruit, sometimes called maypop or passion fruit. The vine grows frantically here.
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Post by gertie on Apr 13, 2010 6:40:34 GMT
Oooh lucky bixa! You know, you really need to just hush and stop posting all those beautiful pictures of where you are. I actually looked up what would be necessary to fly into your area on expedia for grins and giggles the other day but it looks like there isn't an international airport all that close. haha Guess you are safe...for now!
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Post by bixaorellana on Apr 13, 2010 8:28:53 GMT
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