Any advice on cutting these back? my big one has just recently finished flowering which because of the mild has carried on since I brought it in back in late October.
Here it is before Christmas 011 conservatory 029 by charliepridham, on Flickr
Thing is its over 6' , and I know from experience that it will blow over if allowed to be much bigger, I also know the last time I cut it back I either got the timing wrong or was too gungho as it was 9 months before I got any flowers so any advice most welcome :lol:
They look good Charlie, very good. That area has taken on a life of it's own :o
My advice is to cut them just above the fork or y as it's called. Depends how high you want them, would be a shame not to get your nose underneath them. ;)
You could always take some cuttings that will flower earlier on a smaller plant, or give them away as gifts.
I cut mine back to just above each fork in the branches when I bring them in for the Winter. Of course, here, I anticipate a cold enough winter that it will defoliate them - probably would have been find this year and still in flower! Come the spring, when they kick off, they have enough headroom in the conservatory not to hit the roof as they grow out. They are in socking great big pots, which I plunge in the garden, so little chance of blowing over I think. I have to get them out, come Autumn, with an engine crane :) (In fact I cut them back before hoiking them out, otherwise too much of the "top" gets damaged during the extraction and transportation to conservatory.
That is a nice bit of kit to have hanging around in the garden! Must come in real handy if you do a lot of summer bedding planting with pots like that.
After lifting all of the plunged pots and defoliating the plants, I took the largest 'Charles Grimaldi' in last December, intending that the others should follow them upstairs to their usual overwintering spot. But I never bothered. They all spent the Winter outdoors, as I waited for the forecast of the first frost that never came. A few days ago I took the big CG outdoors again. I've only re-plunged that one and the biggest B. insignis 'Rosea', along with the B. suaveolens that I never yanked up at all. The rest are all sitting around on the patio, mainly leafless and dormant, with zero die-back and no Winter damage at all.
If it decides to freeze now, I'll just have to haul the CG in again, but I won't bother with the others unless it's a freakishly severe Spring frost.
Like David, I'm hoping for zero frost's. I cannot remember a winter where the greenhouse plants look as good as they do . Infact, most plants in the garden are looking great.
Quite excited about this years group of seedlings I have this year.
I have made more raised beds to house them and hope to see and register some crackers of mainly hybrid Aureas. I also have some pure Aurea species from Colombia and hope that this will be the year that they flower.
Finger's crossed we will all have a bumper year in growing our exotics, I guess the downside will be more slugs and snails. But it should be a great year for all of us.
Wayne wrote: I guess the downside will be more slugs and snails.
Let battle commence!!
Wayne
It already has here. They've left my B.sanguinea in the greenhouse and gone outdoors. They have already found my Hermodactylus, Erythronium and all the emerging tuberous Salvia shoots. Worse still, the Lily Beetles have found the "giant" Frits.
