Im from Darwin in the north of Australia, 12.6' south of the equator similiar latitude to Bangkok so as you can imagine have a tropical garden as well, but dont have to put quite so much thought and effort into things as you people do. Our climate is sub-equatorial and monsoonal so daytime temps are usually 30-33'C and high humidity and torrential rainfall for half the year ('Wet Season), dry sunny days and clear skies for the rest ('Dry Season')... How does that sound to you all for a climate?!
I would like to take some pics of my garden and post them here so you can see what you are missing out on by living in the polar regions... But I am truly amazed by what you can achieve up there. A lot of local gardens here fail to look as beautiful as yours.
I can relate to growing plants outside of your climatic area - I used to have a thing for trying to grow cool climate plants like rhododendrons, camellias, magnolias and even peach, plums and apples trees. A lot of these grew well in the Dry season but suffered during really heavy wet seasons when we can have constant downpours for weeks on end during January and February. I lost a lot of magnolias and rhododenrons to one extreme wet a few years ago so gave that hobby up as a bad joke... Now I just stick with tropicals but I am so fed up with palms!!! I have been spending thousands of $$$ having huge palms cut down that we planted 30 years ago and now just spread so much mess over the gardens and bring in the rats and bats - so good luck to you all with your efforts with palms! They are weed here...
I had to smile reading your posts about strelitzias especially the Bird of Paradise... Darwin is too hot to grow the Bird of Paradise with much success and they never flower here. I had one for over 12 years that only threw out one leaf a year and in the end I euthanased it and planted bromeliads there instead. S. nicolai grows far too well here and does look amazing, but as tempted as I am to plant one I just dont have the space for one. I do have a rather old Travellers Palm (Ravenala) which are like a S. nicolai but with a solitary trunk instead of a massive clump and it has flowers on it at the moment so will take a pic and post it. At the moment we are at the end of a very good Wet so not too much colour in the garden in the way of flowers, most plants are just growing madly right now and leave the flowering to the Dry, which is a lot cooler than it is now (relatively ...). I do have some pics of some orchids and hibiscus from last dry so will post those.
I dont know if it is possible to just post seeds/cuttings/rhizomes through the post to the UK but if so am happy to send what I can if I can... It could be worth trying some of the heliconias and caladiums- I send them to my Mum in Canberra which is bloody cold by Australian standards believe me. They usually do well in the post and she has great success with caladiums indoors. The heliconias would most likely need a heated greenhouse I would expect but hey never would have expected a Monstera to grow outdoors unheated.
Not sure what else I have that could be able to survive up there. Maybe Xanthostoma which is a bloody great big elephant ear, and of course the 'common' elephant ear Macrorhiza as well. I'll have a look around and see what I find... Would it be worth trying Frangipani (Plumeria)? Have a few gingers as well including some Hedychiums which you would probably already have. Have plenty of palms and lilly pillys seedlings which could do alright indoors The palm seedling I just pull out of my garden in fistfulls as weeds so it wont be any loss if they die on the other side if the world. Lilly pillys (Syzgium) are a native rainforest tree with edible berries. I have known of them to be grown as indoor plants in Australia so cant see why they couldnt in the UK. And besides they are another one that I have to pull out in the thousands or else I will just have a garden of hundreds of huge trees!
Well I have blabbed on enough while you are all in bed - it is a lovely sunny afternoon here but could get a storm in the evening - Darwin is the most lightning prone city in the world apparently...
you must come and visit!
Sean (Troppoz)
