When planting you have to take the greatest care that you are not exposing plants to too much sunshine, or depriving them of it. That you are not planting them in badly drained ground instead of perfectly drained ground.
Gardening folklore
Gardening is full of stories about plants and about the men and women who grew them, and grow them now. Some may even be true. Some of the earlier gardeners of this century were great characters. Larger than life almost.
Further back in gardening history there were no doubt great characters as well. Apart from Gertrude Jekyll and Capability Brown, their names are hard to find, though some of their fantastic techniques live on. In earler times one only planted potatoes on a Good Friday so that the Devil wouldn’t take them. Many only planted anything when there was a new moon. If you were foolish enough to pull up the root of a mandrake, its shriek would drop you dead in your tracks or drive you mad. If you were a society lady, Sir Hugh Platt’s expensive cure for the hangover consisted of crushed pearls, coral and gold leaf; the concoction to be drunk in the morning. Did you know that some plants grew best in a compost of goose dung which has been soaked in bullock blood – none of your Pro-Mix or John Innes composts in those days. Fantastic and unbelievable they were, although many did believe them. Old wives tales which clearly had little to recommend them. Or did they?
Nowadays we are in a very advanced state of knowledge compared to our earlier gardening friends. Almost all the old gardening skills of our forefathers have been discarded for convenience sake when they should have been retained. And long live the eccentric gardeners who make us giggle.
Most people seem to acquire bromeliads as gifts from friends, and initially grow them in pots. In this case the only watering necessary is keeping the urn filled with water and the soil in the pots just a little bit moist. When the plants have finished flowering they are normally knocked out of their pots and placed in a tree where they remain attractive for many months, and also start producing new shoots. You can try tying a few bromeliads in the fork of trees with strong twine and this should be sufficient, but you need to put some leaf mould or fibre around the base to encourage the fibrous roots it produces. Among the best bromeliads plants to grow for pleasure is Aechmea trifasciata which has grey green foliage and a gorgeous pink flower; Nidularium fulgens the centre leaves of which turn crimson near to flowering time, Vriesia splendens with its dark striped leaves and brilliant scarlet flower spike – which, I might add, brings joy to the plant enthusiast when seen growing in its native homeland rain forest in Guyana. The last bromeliad I want to mention in an ornamental sense is the pineapple. Not the edible variety, but a variegated form called Ananus comosus variegatus. It’s a spiny individual but none the less attractive for all that. Hard as nails in the home situation, and producing many little plants from the base if it’s enjoying life with you. It will of course eventually produce a fruit like a pineapple, and just like the commercial plant the variegated form can be propagated by wrenching the top off the fruit when it’s ripe and planting that in a sandy compost; and like it relatives it will also produce little shoots from it’s base to give away to your gardening friends. Christmas is not far off now so get thinking. Until next week take care and may your god go with you.
