Happy New Year!

Happy 2013! :)

It's been a relatively mild winter again - for these parts. I know the north is suffering with a lot of snow from those ridiculously named winter storms. Here, though, not so much. Normally when temperatures are freezing, I fire up the heater and then the schlumbergera plants (Thanksgiving Cacti, Christmas Cactus) freaks out and aborts all their buds. This time around, their buds are blooming like crazy. To be honest, when we have a 'once in a blue moon' night where it drops below 32 degrees, I sort of... haven't been firing up the heater like I should. Then I always assume all the plants in the greenhouse have to be dead by now but they ride it out just fine. In November, there were two nights of 20's, back to back, and the plants were fine in there. I was so surprised.

12/18/12 - Schlumbergera blooming

I purchased a Hippeastrum Papilio bulb from 'East To Grow Bulbs' and I was given an Apple Blossom bulb from a Van Zyverden kit. The flowers finally opened after a month of waiting for the buds to open.

12/31/12 - NOID Red

The 'Apple Blossom' turns out to be something else, which is not unusual. When you buy bulbs from those kits, you never really know what you're going to get. I'm assuming this is Red Lion or something of that sort.

12/31/12 - NOID Red

I am really happy to see that the Papilio I ordered from ETGB is indeed Papilio. Very happy. Even though the blooms weren't big and fancy (which is understandable as it didn't have roots), the flowers are still cool to look at. When spring arrives, I'm going to get this bulb into a big pot and let it grow in there.

12/31/12 - Hippeastrum Papilio

12/31/12 - Hippeastrum Papilio - flash on.

12/31/12 - Hippeastrum Papilio