Bye Bye Paulownia (for now)

We picked up a Paulownia tomentosa back in 2007 and planted it out in Spring 2008, we have since left it to do as it wishes and grow big, forming a nice canopy. However, we decided that since it had flowered well last year that it needed a prune, Lucien also liked the sound of having the bigger leaves on the tree.

Flowering in May 2014

When we saw that Lidl were doing there garden offers this week we had a look and found that they were selling extendable pruning shears with an attachable saw. So, it was decided that this was the weekend to get out and prune the tree.

The only problem is that the local birds have started to use the canopy and a place to chill out.

As you can see from the pictures above and below, the Paulownia spans quite far...

My job (Laura) was to chop all the branches into small pieces and to organise into waste or burning piles, whilst Lucien and his brother James did the sawing. The branches piled up very quickly.

The top branches were a bit challenging to saw because of the tree swaying back and forth with the saw, so Lucien passed the responsibility to James to do the top branches, Sterling work James ;)

The bamboo, Fargesia scabrida, was proving to be a bit of a problem getting caught in all the branches and in the saw, damaging some of the plant. We managed to find some rope and tied it all together so it was as out of the way as possible.

Finally we managed, after a lot of hard slog (and all three of us sawing) to get the tree chopped. We decided to go almost all the way to the ground, we know it will grow again pretty quickly.

More branches, could have done with an extra pair of hands.

The stump that is now left

These are the after shots, without the Paulownia. It definitely looks very strange with it not being there, however it lets a lot more light through to the other plants and we will get used to it soon enough.

The next task is to get the Eucalyptus pruned and chopped, we do however have a man and a chainsaw for that one.. Thank goodness

Laura 

Exmouth in Bloom 2014

We have decided, last minute, to put in our entry for Exmouth in Bloom 2014, we have entered both the front garden and the back garden. Previously, we have won back garden and have been runner up for the front garden quite a few times.

The judging for Exmouth in Bloom will be in the next week or two. So, we have had a very busy weekend trying to clear up the borders, dead head and clear the weeds out of the driveway.

Our lovely cat, Scrappy came out to help us with planting out new plants and getting rid of the weeds in the driveway.

Lucien hard at work clearing up the borders.

New plants waiting to go into their new home, in the garden.

The garage roof was also tackled by Lucien today. Lucien weeded the borders on the roof and cut back the Wisteria and the grapevine.

A very well deserved coffee...

Hopefully we will get a good score this year for our garden. However, we have let it grow out quite a lot. I will keep you all posted.

Laura

Alluring Aroids

We don't often have many pictures of our Aroids that we have around our garden so this is a post dedicated to them. This is to show off how well they are growing and all the different types we have so far.

In the back garden we have a few different types, the most common being Arisaema consanguineum. As you will see from the pictures they multiply quite readily, they do this by producing lots of little corms or bulbs, if you will. This variety also seems to do really well no matter where they are in our garden.

Another variety we have is the Arisaema speciosum, this plant is brilliant for the 'wow' factor from visitors to our garden. The speciosum produces a trio of big leaves on each stem, it flowers early in the season around April or May time and it multiplies by producing big chunky tubers.

The Arisaema nepenthoides, we don't know much about but from my research, I have found that they multiply by producing small tubers that grow in early spring. The patterning on the plant is very nice with reddish brown stripes on the stems.

On the deck, we have got an Arisaema costatum, which appears to look very similar to the speciosum. They have very nice dark purple- chocolate coloured flower and seems to grow just as well as the speciosum for us.

Another Arisaema we have on the deck is, the Arisaema tortuosum. The tortuosum has a very intriguing spathe on its flower and it forms the shape of an 'S'. It also has a really nice patterning on its stem, similar to the patterning on the nepenthoides.

In the front garden, we only have a couple of Arisaemas. We have yet another Arisaema consanguineum which appears slightly later than the consanguineums in the back garden.

The other one is an Arisaema flavum. The flavum is a very petite variety, that has a very small yellow flower. These are the only species of Arisaema that are self fertile. 

Last but not least, we have a small selection of Aroids in the greenhouse. We have a few Amorphorphallus konjac, which is a cousin of the 'Titan Arum' Amorphorphallus titanium. The konjac flower can grow upto 4ft tall, however, we haven't had one flower yet. We currently have a biggish konjac and a few small.

Next to the smaller konjacs we have got Typhonium venosum, which produces a pretty flower that only blooms for a day but smells of rotting flesh. We also have more smaller consanguineums, as they have multiplied so well.

There are some other Aroids that I haven't mentioned as they are only just appearing, watch this space.

We have got some of our Arisaemas from Ben Candlin, he has a wealth of knowledge and is a very keen grower. To anyone interested this is his website: http://www.bencandlin.co.uk/ 

For more pictures of our garden visit our facebook page: Lucien and Laura's Jungle

Laura

It's all nana's to us!

Our banana's seem to be really thriving in our garden this year, must be the warm winter and really wet spring, maybe Lucien's excessive feeding regime. We have also expanded our species of banana in the past year or so.

In the front garden we have four different species of banana. We have a Musa sikkimensis that we got from Urban and Rural Plants in 2011. It has now over taken the Trachycarpus fortuneii in height.

We also have a Musa 'Yangtze', we got it from George at The Palm House, when we went to the Budleigh Plant Fair. It is currently quite small and is being swamped a bit by the surrounding plants.

We got a Musa 'Tibet' from Chad at the Rare Plant Fair at Tregrehan this year. This banana seems to be romping away and we are really impressed with it.

Last but not least, a Musa basjoo from Grub Hubbucks. This is a pup of the one we have in the back garden.

In the back garden, we have a Musa 'Mekong Giant', it seemed to take a little while to get it feet in the ground but now it has the leaves are pushing out fairly quickly.

The Musa basjoo from Grub Hubbucks is growing really well and doesn't appear to have the dwarf like growing habit that he does in Oxford.

These two banana's are a Musa sikkimensis (left) and a Musa basjoo (right), they are pups off other plants and are also growing at a fair rate.

As shown in the previous blog, our Ensete collection, Ensete maurellii 'Hiniba', Ensete maurelii, Ensete 'Tandarra Red'.

This Musa basjoo was the first basjoo that we had, it has never flowered yet because the winters have quite often knocked it back. We are hopeful this year.

We don't think we are doing too badly to say that we don't wrap or protect the banana's in winter, with the exception of the Ensetes which are always cosy in the conservatory.

Laura 

ça fait longtemps

As the title says, its been a long time since I have written a post. I have decided that I should start being proactive and writing the blog posts again.

This year we have decided that we are going to have more flowers than we have had in previous years. We are looking at expanding the flowers through the year too. Currently, we are flower heavy in the spring and as we get to summer the flowers seem to be very vacant.

These are some of our current highlights...

Thalictrum lucidum

Front garden from the footpath

Hardy Callistemon

Canna brasiliensis

 The picture below is of our Ensete collection, we have Ensete ventricosum 'Hiniba', Ensete ventricosum 'Maurellii' and Ensete ventricosum 'tandarra red'.

Different level of our canopy

Musa sikkimensis is now taller than the Trachy fortuneii

Acanthus mollis

This year we have also decided to try and grow vegetables again. We are trying to grow courgette, tomatoes and cucumbers. 

There are more pictures on our Facebook album: July 2014

Until next time...

Laura