Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day December 2014

I love our Brisbane summers: sultry days and fragrant nights, with a wild late afternoon storm often marking the divide. The colours of our summer are red, white, and blazing blue skies as on my driveway with the poinciana, frangipani, and spider lilies in bloom. As the poinciana blooms fall, my visitors walk a red flower carpet to the house in the sunshine and negotiate a treacherously slippery slope after rain.

A fierce afternoon hailstorm that punched holes through the polycarbonate panels in my veranda roof.

Poinciana

Frangipani/plumeria

Spider lily Hymenocallis littoralis

There are more daylilies in bloom. Each morning after greeting the puppies, I walk down to see if there are any new blooms and make an mental note to write an identifying tag for it. I know I have lost a couple over the past twelve months, and many tags were missing at the beginning of the season, so I am anxiously waiting for each and every favourite to make its appearance. Identification can be challenging. Sometimes the colours vary with the weather, and many of the photos in an old catalogue I have bear little resemblance to their real selves.

'Douglas Lycett' 

'Spacecoast Whiteout'

'Spacecoast Seashells'

'Jordan Verhaert' 



Magnolia 'Little Gem' with the petals full of stamens shaken loose by the bees.

Gardenia

I have let the murraya hedge go shaggy, so I can enjoy the fragrant blooms that follow the rain.

A visitor to the frangipani

I popped a mass of caladiums into my wheel barrow so I could sweep the garage floor. I put a river pebble in each pot so I remember something precious is sleeping when they are dormant and don't throw it out as 'empty'.

Finally, another daylily. This one is 'Frank Teele', a gorgeous cherry red for the festive season.

The deep purple salvia to the left is a new addition 'Love and Wishes'

Seasons Greetings to all and a very happy Bloom Day.  To see more of what is blooming in gardens around the world on Bloom Day - the fifteenth of each month - visit our host, Carol, at May Dreams Gardens.

Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day February 2014

Here at Casa Bella our thoughts are with all those affected by extreme weather, from the UK's floods and North America's freeze, to the heatwaves and bushfires in South and Western Australia. I am sure gardening is far from many people's minds, but perhaps this update for Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day can provide a temporary distraction.

It has been a relatively mild summer here in Brisbane. The only unusual feature so far has been the late arrival of our wet season. Hopefully it is just late and not bypassing us completely, or it will be a long dry year ahead.

As usual, my summer garden is dominated by the huge poinciana in the front garden. Because of its size, I used to think of it as fully grown and a static presence, but it is becoming clear that it is still spreading. Many of the sun-loving annuals and perennials planted in the front garden are falling under ever-increasing shade, and a few moves will be in order before next season.

 

Plumeria obtusa with a flowering yucca behind and the red of the Poinciana

 

 

White ixora and variegated pineapple

 

Onslow knows it's all about keeping cool in summer.

I brought my Adenium indoors so I could enjoy the pink and white blooms for a few weeks.

 

These two bromeliads are Achmea 'Burning Bush' and the spotted foliage of Billbergia 'Hallelujah'

Plumeria pudica

Yucca in bloom

The next two plants are not from my garden, but I spotted them on walks and couldn't resist including them.

Gloriosa lily

Russelia

Meanwhile, back on my driveway...



Strelitzia or Bird of Paradise

Miniature ginger Globba winitii

Firespike

 

 

Datura and croton

Here's a close up of the croton. I love tropical foliage. It ensures I have colour all year round even when nothing is in flower.

Another foliage favourite, a Neoregelia bromeliad .

Some of the potted caladiums along the side of the carport.

This pale caladium is one of my favourites.

And finally, I am letting Miss B have the last 'word'. She thinks Onslow gets way too much attention in this blog, just because he is an exhibitionist! 

 

 

To see what is happening in other gardens around the world this Bloom Day, visit Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day host Carol at May Dreams Gardens.

Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day January 2013

January marks midsummer in Australia, and although we have had a week or so of heatwave conditions recently and the garden is a little dry, it is full of colour for the first Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day for 2013.

This was the first year I planted scabious in the garden, and they have been a great success. I sowed the seeds directly into the garden, and it seems that nearly every seed germinated. I will definitely be planting them again next year.

I may have been away for their Spring flush, but the daylilies have continued to brighten the garden with repeat blooms.

'Kent's Favourite Two'

One of my absolute favourites 'Percival James'

Another favourite 'Donna Mead'

'Passion for Life'

'Passion for Life' again

'Isis Unveiled'

A badly focussed photo of the very beautiful 'Jordan Verhaert'

Alongside the daylilies in the front garden, the white ixora 'Kampon's Pride' is a mass of blooms for such a young plant.

The Leopard Lily has self-seeded and sprung up in a few new places but is always a welcome sight.

And the Variegated Alstomeria is re-establishing itself after taking a bit of a pounding while I was away.



One of the showiest bromeliads in flower.

Here is a view of the front garden at the moment, absolutely dominated by the Poinciana Delonix regia.

The white flowers to the right of the poinciana belong to the Hammerhead Frangipani Plumeria pudica.

Elsewhere in the garden, tropical foliage provides almost as much colour as the flowers. Among the more spectacular are the Elephant Ears or Caladiums, a tropical perennial. I am a recent addition to the ranks of their admirers. In just a month I have expanded my 'collection' from two to ten. The second photo is of four new plants I picked up at the local markets.

For December Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day, I was very proud to report that my Yucca was in flower for the first time. If you were thinking it couldn't get any more exciting than that, you are wrong. Just a week or two back, I was gazing vaguely in the direction of the Ponytail Palm Beaucarnea recurvata when I realised it too had come into bud for the first time since I moved here in 2005.

Here are a few photos tracking its progress.

  

I do love my garden; there's always something new popping up and demanding my attention.

To visit more gardens around the world, visit Carol at May Dreams Gardens who hosts the Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day meme on the 15th of each month.