Some things are meant to be

A couple of year ago I experimented with hypertufa, making a couple of test pots.  They were nothing special at the time, but slowly moss started to grow on them and they have turned into much more natural pots.  I have been looking for something to go in them and was surprised to find a little agave filifera at the local garden center.  They are just made for each other.

The agave has a certain compacta look to it, which would be great.  Sadly it is probably just a young plant, so will need some sort of intervention to keep it small. Either way for the next couple of years it is going to be put somewhere to be admired.

Echeveria laui flower

I have said it before, there are few echeverias that have the drama of echeveria laui in flower.

It's echeveria season

The garden and pots are are full of flower spikes at the moment. The best are in the echeveria elegans river, which looks amazing at this time of year.

In the evening they are backlit which adds to the drama.  The bumble bees love them

The concrete egg is full of echeveria cuspidata var zaragoza, which is one of my favourites. Sadly it isn't hardy for my garden so has to be moved inside over winter.

The flowers are are a nicer colour than the very pale elegans.

While out enjoying the evening sun, I thought I might as well plant up the aloe aristatas. I have been trying to get some to survive for the last few years and they seem fine in the main rockery. They have got to a decent size now and have properly started to spred

I have been growing on a pot to plant at the fron of the cycad rockery. The hope is they will contrast well with the echeverias.

Exciting mangave update

So last year was a good mangave and manfreda year, with flowers on two manfredas, more on that in another post, and the mangave flowering.  So a quick recap: the mangave was produce by a friend and is hybrid between manfreda virginica and agave obscura

The pollen was provided by friends over at Crete Lodge exotic garden. They seem to have agaves in flower every year now, this time there were two agaves flowering at the same time. An agave mitis and one labelled as agave horrida, although they suspect it is not.

Photo courtesy of Melissa at Crete Lodge

Isn't that wall amazing, such a shame that the agave left such a big gap.

So the last time I posted progress on the flower spike there were seed pods. It seemed to take forever but finally these opened and amazingly there were seeds. These where sown and placed in a heated prop.  To be honest I was not that confident anything would germinate.

I was wrong, one month later and there were around 40 seedlings.

The problem was that in my eagerness, winter was the wrong time to sow them. They needed to be kept alive until spring and I'm terrible with seedlings: too much water, too little water. So I'm really surprised that 4 months later 19 are still alive. I'll take 50% surviving any day.

I know not very interesting to look at yet. It is only in the last few weeks they have really started to grow, most are now sending out their 2nd proper leaf. How good would it be to have a few new mangaves of my own making. I really hope that some of the horrida (or not) parentage comes through. I do like my toothie plants.

The funny thing is, with the two different pollen donars I would guess I am now the largest mangave producer in the UK. 

The aloe polyphyllas

For many people aloe polyphylla is the must have aloe. The beautiful spiral and the fact that it is one of the hardiest aloes both adding to its attraction.  I have three now, that is if you count the cored multihead one as one plant.  It's still growing well and may be crunch time to decide what to do. Leave it so as not to risk loosing it, or cut it up to at least give two plants.

There are 6 heads in total all about the same size. I figure I could cut down the middle to give two clumps with roots, or cut two heads off to keep a multi-headed plant and separate the rest with or without roots. Either way, some of it is going to have to planted out at some point soon, they are getting too big for pots and grow so much quicker in the ground.

The second plant is one given to me a friend after I managed to kill all my seedlings.  We both got seeds from the same place at the same time, only he managed not to kill his. I am slowly getting better with seedlings due to my mangave hybrids and a few tests on random seeds, so maybe I'll have to try again.  Anyway it has been potted into a 30cm pot to give it one more year in which I can bring it inside.  I will probaly just place it where the plant will be in the new section of the rockery.

I think in the Uk they need to be about 30cm at least to survive planted out, even then I will most likely cover it just to give it that little extra protection.

The final plant is the large one. It sailed through winter without any damage.

The exciting news is that it is flowering again, having had a year off last year.

It will be a couple of months before the flower is fully open, but good to know it is back to flowering.

Moving the agave salmiana

It was not possible to put it off any longer time to clear this section ready to expand the rockery.

The aloe striatula, large agave salmiana and the covered agave ferox all needed digging out.  The right side of the railway sleeper was cleared yesterday and the lower palm fronds removed to make access a bit easier. Given the size of the plants, and the length of the terminal spines, time for a little protection.

The aloe striatula came out nice and easily. As there are others in the garden they were just cut up. The little agave ferox also came quickly.  The soil is 50% gravel so the roots pull out without requiring too much force.

It is funny to think this was exactly the same size of the agave salmiana when they were planted, especially given that the full name is agave salmiana var ferox. Then onto the big one.  Digging the roots out was easy, getting it out of the spot was not.  In the end it was manhandled into a big sheet.
This could then be dragged / carried from the back of the house to the front where it would be replanted.  So the first section of the extension to the rockery is complete.

In the front, space had to be cleared in the central bed. I haven't shown much of the front as it's a bit more mixed. The central bed is a large oval, which is the perfect spot to let the agave get to its full size.

Once some space had been created, the agave was lifted into position and slipped almost perfectly into place.  It was nice that it went without issue and too many more stabs.

It's a little sad how small the agave looks in its new home.  It will grow and no doubt given a few years will swamp the other plants in there. Currently the best view is from above.

Not a bad start to the weekend. Sadly the rockery stone is not going to be here until next week, so I'll continue removing the plants from the main rockery. 

A short visit with plants. Part 1.

Last weekend I finally got to the island of Madeira. It was only for a few days and with the in-laws, so there was limited time to visit gardens.  We did manage to sneak in a few gardens though. I had been warned in advance that Madeira is not famous for succulents; a lot of rain and no frosts make it perfect climate for too many other plants.  So the next few posts will contain lots of photos, but very few succulents, hopefully the gardens will be of interest, just for something different.

First morning we went to one of the orchid nurseries,

This is pretty much in the centre of Funchal, only 1km from the front. However it is all up hill, and in Madeira that really means up hill.  So having recovered, it was a pleasure to be greated by this set of aloes inside the gate.

This was the only larger aloe I saw on the whole trip. In the garden you get the advantage of those steep hills.

The outside area did have some lovely other plants. I expected the tropical flowers, but didn't expect to see so many different trees.

Anyway you don't visit for the trees, and as soon as you get into the nursery it is clear why you are there.

It would be pretty amazing if that was the whole place, but it wouldn't be Madeira if it was. No you have this:

The photo shows two of the main sections, turn around and you get even more:

I loved that they use tree ferns to create deeper shade. You can see the whole site is on slope, there is no flat land anywhere. There is another section the same size on top of this.  It was an amazing collection and if the orchids were not enough you can look up and notice that the vine above the main path is a jade vine.

The flowers are such a stunning colour, and if possile the buds are even better.

It takes some getting used to, having so many spectacular plants everywhere you look.

You could spend hours there photographing every flower, and smelling them to find out where the different scents were from.  When you do finally leave you are greated by the owners other interest which is bromeliads. Initially it is just the odd pot

Then you are out into the path between the shade houses.

There was a little spanish moss starter wall,

It is such a simple idea to form balls or boxes with a little bit of spanish moss inside and then in a few years you have your full waterfall.

 It doesn't matter what they look like, they will be hidden before you know it. I did try a few years ago, and forgot to water so lost my little clump.  I am tempted to try again.

There were some nice clumps of tillandsias as well. If only mine would grow into clumps like this.

As an introduction to Madeira it was perfect, such plant extravagance you simply don't know where to look.