Spiral Ginger update!

I cut off one stalk on my Spiral ginger so it could focus on making healthy pups. Looks like it worked! A nice and healthy new pup is on the way. Can't wait until it gets big, they are beautiful plants.

Castor Bean today

My potted Castor bean is growing insanely fast.  Here's a look at it today! 

Update in my Front yard today!

Here are a few pics from the front yard.

Here's my Loquat making a second flush of growth for the season. This is the first year in the ground for it.

Here's a view of both castor beans, my Crape Mytle "Zuni", and my Ensete from my front porch. 

My Ensete is really getting huge. I love this plant! My Hardy hibiscus is blooming really well also! 

Closeup of the Kopper King Hibiscus! 

 About the best view that you can get of my washy this time of the year. Knockout Roses are doing well too!

Crape Myrtle "Tuscarora"

Crape Myrtle "Zuni" with some spanish moss.

Cucuzza fruit starting to pop up! 

Under the banana leaves! 

Thailand giant elephant ears pup like crazy! I have about 15 plants!

Pics of some blooms in my front yard this evening….

My Crape Myrtle with some spanish moss. Spanish moss loves growing on crape myrtles and Ir early like the look!

Close up…

Knockout roses putting on their second show of the season.

Here are some late-night pics around the front yard.

Some more of that spanish moss 

The Ensete has a nice look at night. You can see the leaves on the popcorn plant folded up for the night.

Anyone able to ID the bug inside my Cucuzza squash flower?

Castor Bean, Thailand Giant elephant ears, and my Blooming Sabal minor.

Some more Cucuzza blooms. This vine grows INSANELY fast. I'm not kidding when I say this may take over my entire front yard by the time the first frost hits. The blooms are beautiful, but only open at night (starting at about 7pm)

I was so frustrated with this plant because it just wasn't making any fruit. But today I saw the first fruit of the season from it! Cannot wait to taste some Cucuzzi! They are supposed to taste like Zucchini. 

That's all for now! Thanks for looking!

Crape Myrtle and Kopper King Hibiscus finally started blooming today!

My Crape Myrtle Zuni opened up it's first blooms today and so did my Kopper King Hibiscus. They are definitely the official sign that we are in mid summer. Both plants are looking happy!

Growth Rate on my Castor Bean

This is my first year growing castor beans and so far I'm impressed. I got this plant about 15 days ago (2 weeks!) for 3 dollars and it's already grown so much! Here's a look at it's life in my yard so far. It seems to get bigger  by the day!
*** Keep in mind though that unfortunately, each of these pictures are more zoomed in than the last so the plant appears to be growing even larger than it actually is. Sorry about that!
I determined it's growth rate by competing it to the bricks and to the size of the begonias.

July 10, 2014

July 20, 2014

July 25, 2014

Update on the Mandevilla vines

I love this vine! I mean I've never had a plant climb up this lamp post so nicely. Not sure if it will look this nice in a few more weeks when it is overgrown, but it's perfect the way it looks right now!

A nice substitute for Mandevilla vines if you are hoping for something smaller growing are Dipladenias. If you can find them cheap at a local nursery, they are a very inexpensive and beautiful way to fill out a planter. Annuals don't come cheap AND beautiful most of the time, but Dipladenias might be an exception!

Another beautiful Mandevilla are the white flowered Mandevillas. Slightly less vigorous than the pink flowered ones, but definitely still a VERY fast grower and a beautiful bloomer. Mine has had more blooms in the past, but I kind of like that it is showing a little bit of greenery because the leaves are also beautiful!

Not exactly a Mandevilla, but it isn't an Allamanda either! It's called a Yellow Mandevilla aka Urechites lutea. It's a beautiful yellow flowering vine, but very hard to take a good pic of it. It looks much nicer in person!

Thanks for looking!

Hot and humid today, just how my plants like it!

It was a pretty beautiful afternoon. Definitely one of the best pool days in a while and I really loved the heat and humidity today. My plants looked like they were loving it too. Here's a few shots!

My pool plants are getting bigger by the day. Still scared to get too close to them with the yellow jacket nest getting bigger and bigger by the day as well. I will make a nice post about that in a week or so when I finally make my move to get rid of the yellow jackets once and for all!

My plumeria filled out nicely over the past few months. Nothing better than some beautiful puffy cumulous clouds as a backdrop. You can tell there will be some nice thunderstorms in the area tonight with all this humidity and a nice front moving in.

My hibiscus is doing it's own thing. Lots of buds but blooms are not a daily occurrence yet (I'll get a bloom or 2 every other day). Hopefully they will be blooming full force August-October!

Thanks for looking! If you don't like this weather cooler and drier weather is on the way for the end of the week!

Trachycarpus fortunei