Steve L

Crawfish boil sounds great. I've got all the stuff. The Lat. Orange Gyro is supposed to be a fairly cold hardy heliconia. I'm not growing that one. I'm afraid that Zingiber Malaysianum "Midnight" in not going to be a good performer for you. I grew it in the ground for 3 years and each year it came back about half the size until it just disappeared and I had it in a protected spot. I then grew it in a pot and it went totally dormant in my greenhouse; it's an evergreen zingiber and is not supposed to go dormant. It hasn't come back yet in the pot. I need to check it out to see if there is anything left. In 5 years of growing this ginger, I never bloomed it. A nicer zingiber ginger is Z. Collinsii "silver streaks". Hardy in our zone and nice blooms after the first year. A real winner.

Steve

southlatropical

Steve,
If you want to try the Orange Gyro, I have plenty. I may even have an offset of the H. lingulata 'Red Tip Fan by the time I make it out there. The wife decided she wants to go to Jazz Fest in New Orleans instead of the Contraband Days festival in Lake Charles. So it will likely be a while longer before we are in your area.

__________________

Lagniappe

A crawfish boil sounds like a great idea for a meet-up !

Great plant Brent! Best of luck to you.

Bananaman88

What do ya think, Steve? Sometime later this year?

Steve L

We need to do it before the end of June; otherwise, we won't be able to get any crawfish. I'll check the calendar. I know the last weekend of May is out and so is the last weekend of June.

Steve

chumleyrobert

Hey, if either of you want to do some trading, let me know. I think I have Curcuma "Roscoianna" and maybe others in the Zingerberacea family. and in addition to that I have many aroids, philos,anthuriums, yucca, agaves, bananas, furcraea, aloes, and many, many cycads . Many of these items are unusual and I have "Hybrids". Thanks, Robert Chumley chumleycycads.c

southlatropical

Robert,
I would be very interested in a cycad or two and maybe some other stuff. Here is a link to my trade list on Gardenweb.
southlatropical's GardenWeb Exchange Page
Many of the plants on that list will not be available until later this year. But if you see something you like just let me know. What cycads would you recommend for zone 9? I have some sagos and would like something with a different look.

__________________

Bananaman88

Steve,

I know I have family coming in to town from May 21-28. Hopefully I could make any other time unless my new job has me working weekends (I know it will require some). This will be a lot of fun if we can make it happen! Let me know what you need and I'll be glad to help!

Bananaman88

Alright, I got my new baby in the ground today. I had to move some 'Bengal Tiger' cannas to a different spot in the landscape so I would have room for the 'Ae-Ae'. I dug about a 2' diameter hole, dumped in some leaves left over from last year, added some Miracle Grow garden soil, some old potting soil from 2 hanging baskets I was getting rid of, and about 1/2 gallon of granular organic fetilizer, mixed it all together well and planted the Ae-Ae right in the middle and watered it in. It will get part sun-part shade in this location. Hopefully it will do well. The worst part is it will have to compete with a nearby maple and my neighbors Ilex opacas that are right on the other side of the fence. I'll try to post a picture of it tomorrow and update it occasionally.

damaclese

Robert i see frome your profill that u have a AeAe
would u hapin to have any pups u would like to sell i realy dont have any thing to trad as most my gardin is rather new new house hehehe

__________________
Helping to foster understanding for the learning disabled

devildog805

Congrats, nice looking AE-AE.

Bananaman88

Here's an update on the growth of my Ae-Ae.

mskitty38583

when you get tired of looking at those beautiful, graceful,elegant, lovely leaves....my shipping addy is........lol! it is a beautiful tree. congrats and yahoo!

__________________
WELCOME TO THE GATOR NATION

Dean W.

Nice!

__________________

musa_monkey

wow outstanding pup. best of luck with it

Bananaman88

Thanks for the kind words, everyone. I'm doing my best with it. I've sited it in a spot where it gets some sun/some shade, but it seems to be getting more sun during the hottest part of the day than I had planned. Hopefully it will adjust and do well.

harveyc

Congrats, Brent, it's looking nice. Can you explain your zone 9 climate a bit, please. What were your nightly lows when you planted it in the ground and dayly highs? What kind of temperatures do you have now?

I've been considering putting one of my pups in the ground (one is large and doing very nicely in my greenhouse). Over the past few days my nightly lows have been down to 52F and highs up 84F but our humidity is low (down to 20%) and we get quite a few dry winds this time of year. I may be putting in some misters/foggers and contstruct a screen house or something like that to create both partial shade and protect from winds. I'm just a little too chicken to put it out in the ground right now!!!

__________________

Bananaman88

[quote=harveyc;37156]Congrats, Brent, it's looking nice. Can you explain your zone 9 climate a bit, please. What were your nightly lows when you planted it in the ground and dayly highs? What kind of temperatures do you have now?

Harvey,

Thanks for the questions. I planted my Ae-Ae in the ground just a few days after receiving it (see first post of this thread) so it's been in the ground for between 3 and 4 wks. now. Temps back then were still getting down in the mid-40's for the lows at time, but mostly in the 50's. Highs were in the mid-70's but have since graduated to mid-high 80's with a few low 90's thrown in already. Our humidity here in Southeast TX is always high unless we've just had a cold front come through. It's nothing to wake up in the morning and have over 80% humidity, and that's year round. Even when fronts do go through we are so close to the coast that they often back up on us as a warm front a day or two later and bring the humidity right back up. Temps this week are supposed to be in the the mid-80's for highs.

Hope this helps you!

harveyc

Thanks, Brent. I know you have that "wet" kind of heat down there and you can have it! How low does your humidity get during the hottest part of the day?

By the way, I'm glad I didn't plant my Ae Ae out a month ago even though we were having some nice spring days since we had some really late frost this year that damaged many crops. I didn't have frost here in April but did get down to 38F or so but some nearby areas had frost. My greenhouse Ae Ae is putting out a new leaf every 7-10 days right now. It doesn't get below 60F in my greenhouse and the humidity stays a bit higher.

__________________

Bananaman88

I'm not sure what the humidity gets down to during the day. Early in the morning and over night is the worst, but suffice it to say that it doesn't drop enough to make it feel much better during the hottest part of the year. From June-early Oct, Houston is not a very fun place to be...unless you're a banana or banana nut!