Some Zingerberaceae from Peninsular M'sia

[GARYnNAT]

and as soon as someone discovers something exciting, it won't be long before we all have one .

Spot on Simon, wonder what will be this years must have at Akamba....i guess yours will be Betchnum tabulare Simon?

Gary

[Tog Tan]

Hey guys, I find that sometimes the word exotic is way over rated. Though I come from a place where the exotics are and easily available due to the craze of the people, I still get a big kick in looking for weird plants in the wild. Weird meaning stuff which may be variegated or with a mutated growth.

The thing I taught myself is to be observant in the common nurseries (garden centres as you call it) and look for something odd in the common plants. I have through the years got hold of a couple of newly mutating plants, like some of them just about to go variegated. Here are just 2 pix of what I mean;

I picked this Heliconia psitacorum hybrid up just a couple of days ago at a nursery near my house. There were 2 bags of this amongst a whole lot of them. As they are very common here, no one gives them a second glance. This mutation is a result of a corm being divided and propagated many, many times, kinda like TC. Guess how much? 2 bags for less than $3!

I found this Alocasia macrohiza as a 9in leaf slightly yellowish plant at a nursery. As it grew, the mutation intensified to the point where it has a yellow base with splinters of green. I call it my Picasso! It got to be more than 3ft and it had to go to my nursery and into the ground.

[simon]

and as soon as someone discovers something exciting, it won't be long before we all have one .

Spot on Simon, wonder what will be this years must have at Akamba....i guess yours will be Betchnum tabulare Simon?

I wouldn't want to disappoint you, Gary .

Is it hardy?

[GARYnNAT]

and as soon as someone discovers something exciting, it won't be long before we all have one .

Spot on Simon, wonder what will be this years must have at Akamba....i guess yours will be Betchnum tabulare Simon?

I wouldn't want to disappoint you, Gary .

Is it hardy?

Hi Simon

I kept mine in its pot once we knew we would be moving, we had lows of -6.9c in the garden, the tabulare was not protected and has some burnt fronds but its unfuling lots of new crosiers at the moment so yes it seems pretty hardy

Gary

[Dave Brown]

I think many UK people's view of an exotic garden is what they see on a Mediterranean or foreign holiday, so the Palms are what stick in their mind. Probably Phoenix canariensis_CIDP, Washingtonia and Coconut being the most common. Therefore when people come across Trachycarpus, Phoenix canariensis_CIDP at a GC it fits in with their idea of a holiday (exotic) garden. TTrachycarpus are very important as they are reliably hardy and make the exotic year round stucture of the garden. Once these are in place you can infill with more tender herbacious plants. ie Ginger, Canna, Colocaisa, Alocasia Banana etc, but they are only late spring, summer and part of autumn plants, dying off, or having to be lifted for winter.

In the winter we have just had, only the really hardy have survived, with most more tropical things mushed. This is why the backbone has to be more mundane, but having said that Trachycarpus is really exotic in a uk garden, as most people have been brought up to think no Palms will grow here.

[Alexander]

I can still remember I met a long time ago a Dutch woman whom said to me: In Southern England thay have a tropical climate there because I have seen palmtrees there... She had been there by the way.

Alexander

[Alexander]

About common plants versus noncommon ones. We have here a wild Primula, P. vulgaris wich in the wild is very rare here but a beautifull plant for the springtime. In gardencenters they sell things like P. denticulata and other Primulas from far away places. And ugly cultivars. But the real wild P. vulgaris is hard to come by. I have plants from all over the world, including a lot of native ones. Native plants next to stuff from Chili, why not, as long as I like them.

Alexander