mnorell

Steve—

Thanks for the exhaustive rundown on everything. Sounds like you have the drainage thing pretty well under hand, perhaps the live oak canopy is a mixed blessing. Maybe for the borderline root-hardy single-season bloomers like Golden Torch and hirsuta it would be best to just let them go down in winter but have the added soil-warmth provided by sun-exposure during the day, and leave the shade and chill-tolerant types that need to overwinter their stems (schiediana, latispatha, etc.) under the live oaks. I guess I’ll find out something next spring since mine really don’t have anything overhead that is reliably evergreen, but they should get a good amount of sun on the soil (if the sun decides to shine, that is!)

Have you tried aurantiaca? These always look ratty to me, whether in my garden or in Miami at Fairchild…and I’ve just read something on the internet that says these grow in undisturbed (=dark) forest floors in Belize. But unfortunately I’m pretty sure they are very seasonal in blooming, and only do their thing in winter or spring. But I’m thinking I may move mine from a hot dry exposure in full sun to underneath a line of densely canopied cherry-laurel trees on a bank that gets some low-angle sun in winter but is pretty dim the rest of the year, but protected from rain (summer and winter). This would give the plant a lot of extra protection from the dense overhead as well as tall, dense holly ferns, aspidistra and tree-stumps at the top of the bank that provide a good windbreak. I had a lot of things come back (or overwinter without damage) in those conditions this past winter, though we had several hard freezes. My Zamia furfuracea stayed in pretty good shape until the final freeze in February when it lost the last of its leaves (and looks perfect now); Jacobinia carnea stayed fully evergreen, as did Philodendron selloum; and several other things did fine with some protective mulch. Even a small, struggling Alocasia ‘Sarian’ that I had rescued just before the cold from a soggy low-spot managed to come back (late) this season under that cherry-laurel canopy, while all other large specimens I had just flat-out croaked. So it’s a pretty good microclimate if the plant is shade-tolerant enough, and I’m thinking aurantiaca may be able to make it, as it’s by most accounts a shade-tolerant plant. I have one of my rostratas on the edge of that canopy so it can get some sun; I’m not sure how much shade these can take and still bloom.

One thing about seasonality: I saw someone’s post on the internet (from Hawai’i) saying that some Heliconias will do a seasonal trigger even if they have no leaves; a bud will apparently just sprout with a flower. Those listed were vaginalis and wagneriana. I’m thinking I’ve read that sometimes rostrata will throw up a flower without leaves, have you ever seen this? Also I wonder if this is what happened with your schiediana.

Very interesting about the chicken manure, and I’ll try to get some for next spring. I'm assuming it's particularly acid. I’ve often heard that Musa coccinea requires very acid soil, and I did work hard to put lots of peat into the soil around my strongest-growing mat, and gave one supplemental feeding of Miracid; but I’m wondering if you add the manure to that plant that it may explain its extreme vigor in your garden. I’ve heard other reports that coccinea will come back way up in zone 8, which surprises me a little since it seems so delicate. But perhaps the rhizome, once it’s attained a good size, is resistant to rotting in the cold and wet soil. It amazes me since this is such a spectacular flower, one would think just because “it’s always the case” that something like that would wilt and die at the lightest chill. Anything you can share on that front would be welcome here where I have searched for the plant for years, finally have a good source but managed to lose my small struggling specimen last year. I’d like to have some flowers this year (the largest one is on its 8th leaf right now and I’m still hopeful) and get these two mats to survive the winter. Nights will go into the 50s next month so I’m hoping September turns out to be a big-growth period. We had over 2” from Humberto yesterday and I swear things jumped up out of the ground with that nice ionized rain-water!

Have you tried any other of the Mexican species like spissa? Also I wonder about x nickeriensis, which is a hybrid between psittacorum and marginata. I don’t know about marginata’s provenance or cold-hardiness but I wonder if it’s hardier than psittacorum.

I’m going to look for fernandezii (though I can’t even find a picture of this one on the internet!) as well as some of the other cold-tolerant species like beckneri, bella, cordata, dielsiana and lanksteri, which are pretty cool-looking plants…all material for next winter’s homework!

Michael