Re: Cordyline indivisa update

Doobieous wrote:

Back in winter of last year I'd attempted germination
of Cordyline indivisa. I put a few seeds into a
plastic bag with moist soil and put it outside during
winter. By January all of the seeds had sprouted. I'd
kept them in a shallow tray for a long time and they
seemed to stop growing for a couple of months. Then, a
few weeks ago, I potted the three biggest and
strongest into a deeper terracotta flower pot. They
seem really happy now because they've greened up and
are beginning to grow again:

They seem to be happy at this stage with the weather
we have here in Marina. They don't even seem to mind
being in full sun either.
You are to be congratulated in getting this most difficult species to this stage and your seedlings certainly look healthy.

I should though be very cautious about how much sun they get, In the wild they are strictly a mountain species and do not take at all kindly to lowland heat.

I have had little personal experience of this species myself as a garden plant, though I have seen them growing in the wild and they are most handsome with large and beautiful leaves.

This is what the NZ Encyclopedia of Native Plants has to say:-
"unfortunately, C.indivisa can be difficult to grow and short lived in garden situations, requiring deep rich soil, semi-shade and damp conditions." Good luck!!

The only large species of this genus I am personally acquainted with is that tough campaigner C australis, which is often a (usually welcome) weed in local gardens! I got the only one I have from nature, who however planted it in a little group of various native trees so it had to grow an excessively long stem to get clear of other foliage and now has a handsome head of leaves and also flowers in season so high up it gives the neck a crick to view them.

There was a panic a few years ago when specimens around Auckland began to suffer a severe dieback, but fortunately the virulence of the disease seems to have been nearly spent by the time the epidemic reached south as far as Wellington and only a few trees in this area were affected. the scare had had a curious effect though on our local perception of the charm and value of the plant and now one sees new young specimens everywhere, especially in municipal plantings. We look like being engulfed in a wave of cabbage trees in the next few years!

It is in fact it is a remarkable plant in the climate range under which it is happy, being found wild in NZ from the sub-tropical north to the cold temperate climate of Southland and extending with human help overseas even to Scotland, where I have seen pictures of large specimens standing in the snow!

In the same area as my big guest I also have planted the small hybrid "Red Fountain" (C.pumilio X C. banksii) which is happy to grow as an undershrub and has brilliant crimson-purple foliage, very striking if the snails do not find it.

Also, I have some questions on a solanum found growing
in my garden:



I've never seen this type before, and I'd pulled it up

already. What could it be?


The flowers are the typical star shape, but were about

7mm wide. You can see a fine hairiness to the stems.

I'd pulled it before the fruits could really form.

Does it look familiar?



Looks uncommonly like the annual S, nigrum (Black nightshade) to me.

My English Flora describes this as a world wide weed of cultivation. I
have seen it both in Britain and here (where it apparently hitched a
lift with the early European settlers like most of our local weed flora.)



It was wise to pull it up before it could set fruit as it can be hard to
eradicate once established because of copious seeding. If you had left
it you would have got small round berries, which are poisonous while
green but when mature turn a rich black and are said to then be edible!



Moira

--

Tony & Moira Ryan,

Wainuiomata, North Island, NZ. Pictures of our garden at:-

http://mywebpages.comcast.net/cherie1/Garden/TonyandMoira/index.htm

NEW PICTURES AND DIAGRAMS ADDED 20/Feb/2005















Other Mailing lists |
Author Index |
Date Index |
Subject Index |
Thread Index