Nursery visit

I went down to the nursery as a shipment of plants is due this month-alas we have to wait for 2 more weeks as the shipment has not yet arrived. Meanwhile this is some of what they have. Mostly very large plants, not the 1-5 gallon sizes I prefer. I love these 2 frangipani (plumeria)



A towering palm planted on the grounds provides a “showpiece” for their huge selection of palms. Many people (and resorts) here buy large plants for instant landscaping, so the choice of small plants is very small. I’ve grown most of my palms from seeds collected from under palm trees as I can’t afford these large palms.




Fruit of the geiger tree

White cordia blooms


I love traveller's palms but on a dry island you have to spend hundreds on water to manage this...

At last some people seem to be interested in succulents and xeric plants so I am actually able to get a small selection

I got this one and love it. Sold as "cordyline" I think its actually yucca bright edge.


Big grasses: bamboo and sugar cane


To think my grandfather had 200 acres of sugar cane and I have to buy one plant now for $35...

The nursery has a range of unlabeled hibiscus-I've grabbed quite a few on various visits as different colors were in bloom-will post on those later

Pretty bougainvillea

Masses of ixora

June Blooms

Thanks, Carol, for hosting another

Blooms Day

Lots of lovely flowers in my garden. We start with "nature's collage": fuchsia bougainvillea and white oleander below the agave bloomstalk in the sky.

more bougainvillea


Gorgeous hibiscus



Cool whites
Plumeria pudica and my new frangipani



Hot reds and corals:
Aloe maculata, coral hibiscus, russelia, Mirandy rose

Roses

Though my subjects are quite limited I am pleased to be able to take part in this month's Gardening Gone Wild Picture Contest . After all, roses don't really thrive on my hot dry island, especially in the summer heat. For this same reason its not very often rose plants show up for sale.

This is a rose I acquired a few months ago when it was for sale at the nursery, a Mirandy rose. Mirandy is a Hybrid Tea Rose hybridized by Walter Lammerts in the US in 1945. It has a perfect rose form and a rich saturated velvet red color. So far it seems to be doing well, better that the other 6 varieties I bought a few years ago and which succumbed to the heat or whatever in 6 months. The plant has doubled in size in 6 months, something the other rose plants did not do.

Last week I got a small damask rose plant-these old fashioned types seem to do better here-so I have high hopes for that one.

Silver Salmon

A beautiful sunset sky and seascape with the outline of the trees


This is a new agave bloomstalk!

A colonial era garden

My work recently took me to a meeting with the Pro Vice Chancellor of the University of the West Indies (I attended the university for both my graduate and post-graduate studies). The Pro Vice Chancellor’s office is in this lovely old colonial building, with thirteen foot ceilings and 8 foot doors.

What is always remarkable about the St Augustine campus of the University is the variety of fabulous tropical trees and plants, and the landscaping around the principal’s office is particularly lovely. The presence and sheer variety of this flora is due to the university’s history: in 1960, the Imperial College of Tropical Agriculture became the Faculty of Agriculture of the then University College of the West Indies (now the University of the West Indies).

The Imperial College of Tropical Agriculture in Trinidad was the center for postgraduate training in tropical agriculture for the agricultural services of the British Colonial Empire. College reports from 1938 indicate that 159 past students of the College have been appointed to the Colonial Agricultural Service and allied services, in posts in thirty different parts of the British Empire.

Very old frangipani tree


Entrance to Principal's office



tall stately palms


Bromeliads on the tree trunks

Having fun with my new little pothound, Pott

He came to me totally unexpected-a friend who saw him thought he’d be a good companion for PottRott (as he has turned out to be). Now he's quite a way from an undernourished, 2 pound, flea ridden and patches of hair missing puppy.

He is a most amusing puppy, very full of himself, but extremely self sufficient. Less than a week after I got him I had to travel and so boarded him. Amy said the first night she put him in a crate in a room by himself he screamed and screamed so she had to let him sleep with all the big dogs who were boarding. With his little two pound self he handled all these 100 pound plus dogs-including a male Rottweiler and a part Pittbull, with amazing aplomb.

Blooms Day April 09

I was traveling on the 15th and 16th and did not want to miss another blooms day-so here I am two days late. A lot of blooms after a week of rain and cooler weather.

One of my new plants- a huge lovely red hibiscus

Hot oranges: tecoma elata and Mexican honeysuckle



Euphorbia milli in front of aloe arborescens


in hot pink

A very full bunch of ivory russelia


celestial blooms



Pink Tabebuia in its first bloom for the year