Surprise Sunflowers!

Evidently some seeds fell out of the sunflowers I had on my stoop this summer and into the pot of soil, which I have been reusing as extra fill in some of my propagations this winter.  In like 3 days, sprouts shot up out of the prayer plant pot to a height (and with a growth rate) that removed any doubt about the sprouts being new prayers popping up.

I don't expect these sunflowers to last long, as there is probably not nearly enough sun for them these next few months.  Frankly, I don't know what ignited their growth in the first place - perhaps just adding water woke them up?  I'd have thought they'd require some sort of dormant time after growth, but maybe the water, sun and (indoor) temperature threw off the growth cycle.  One of the three sprouts has already shriveled up, for the remaining two it is only a matter of time.

Cyclamen

Wow, this morning I realized I had never made a post, or really a label-worthy mention, of my cyclamen!  I don't recall when I got this one, but if I had to guess I would say about a year ago?  This one tends to bloom in the autumn/winter and is a distinct red color, which leads me to believe it is cyclamen persicum.

So, after I received it, I put it into this plastic red pot you see on the right below.  Again, nowadays I would totally drop a layer of river rock in there to help with drainage even though it has built-in drainage, but back then I wasn't of that practice yet.  At some point this year I decided plastic pots were no longer showy enough, so I started migrating all of my plants into ceramic pots.  For this one, I tried to shimmy the root/tubular mass into that blue-striped vase on the left.  Yeah I think it took like 10 minutes and I might have squeezed it down, but it was clear that could never be a permanent home.

I ended up putting it in a glass vase, which is a much better fit, and actually looks quite nice.  I thought this would also help with keeping the leaves in a more dense arrangement - the leaves and flowers would drape over the edge of the red pot and just look like a jumbly mess.  What I ended up deciding to do was twist-tying the stems in a tighter bundle, which you can see in the image below.  I think it looks much nicer.

When I saw these in Bucks Country Garden yesterday, all the plants had the blooms shooting up right in the center of all the leaves.  It looked pretty slick and I'm wondering if there is a way I can achieve that effect... Perhaps my muddling with the roots and such messed up this growth formation.

Below is a closeup of the twist tie I have used to snug up the stems of the leaves and blooms.  It actually doesn't look really tight at the moment, I occasionally adjust it as needed.

So, this happens if you don't regularly rotate your plants - all the leaves and blooms face the window. At this point, of course I just spin it 180 and let all the pretty parts face me at the sink.  Eventually they'll all twist and turn to face out the window again.

And below is the pretty front side!

Impending Bloom Boom!

I haven't necessarily been neglecting my plants lately, I just haven't inspected them as thoroughly as I sometimes do.  That is until today when I was making my watering rounds and I noticed a few of the little rascals are gearing up to pop some buds pretty soon!

Here is my kalanchoe plant FINALLY starting to show signs of blooms again!  I caught these little pricks out of the corner of my eye and was like WHOA, something is going on here!  So I brought it out into the light and took a closer examination.

We have a couple peaks here showing some new growth formations!

Below is what a typical new leaf growth looks like...

...and below you can see the new bloom growth adjacent to typical leaf growth.  Yeah, I'm pretty sure we have some blooms making their way back into this plant!

And my oh my I did not even see this spike start, look how long it has gotten!

What I like about this orchid arrangement is I can see that the roots are doing very well.  I never really water this one much, since the water tends to never really evaporate from the bottom - possibly because of the shape of this vase?  I mean, the soil is mostly bark so there is plenty of airspace - although it is rather tall so maybe that makes it tough for the water to dry out?  I'm just pondering this because the plants that I have in smaller glass jars or vases definitely dry out, and I can't quite put my finger on why this one doesn't.  Perhaps it's a moot point, given that we have a nice spike going here!

New Babe! Moses in the Cradle (Rhoeo)

Ok, so the second babe I bought today - also at Bucks Country Gardens - was this little Moses in the cradle plant.  Another five-dollar-four-incher, I again decided to step it up to a s lightly larger pot (again, primarily because this is the only size pot I have right now!)

As I suspected, a little pot-bound root action.  This is probably not too bad and might actually be good for some plants to be kept like this, but mehhh I'll step it up.

With a stone base and layer of soil in the pot, I added the plant and filled in soil around the edges.  I used the same mix I described in the previous post.  What I have read so far is that this plant is best kept slightly dryer, it can be easily overwatered and develop root rot.  Having made that mistake with my Chinese evergreen, I will try my hardest not to mistake this one for my palm (they kind of look alike to me.. sort of?).

New Babe! Prayer Plant (Maranta leucoreura)

I decided it had been long enough since I last bought a new plant.  Particularly since I have given some away and taken some to work, it was starting to feel a little stale around here.  (Granted, I to have a number of babes about to bloom, or in bloom, but still - I need some new green!)  So I stopped by Bucks Country Gardens 10 minutes before closing tonight and picked up two beauties (second plant to follow in subsequent post).  The image below is the prayer plant repotted and nestled into its new home by an east-facing window between two dormant polka dot plants.

This plant was about $5 and came in a 4" container.

I decided to step it up into a slightly larger pot - mainly because that is the only size I currently have, but also because I suspected this little guy had outgrown its nursery plastic.  I have gotten into the habit lately of lining my pots with stones even if they have built in drains and water saucers.  So that was step 1, shown below:

As I suspected, we have a little bit of pot-bound-ness going on here.

 
 I took some potting soil I had already mixed a few weeks ago for, I think, my dracaena, and added some peat moss to give it more substance.  I put a few scoops in over the stones to give those bound roots something to sink into, and then just filled soil in around the sides of the pot.  I sometimes forget to keep the soil an inch-ish below the lip of the pot, but I think in this case I did all right, although its more like 1/2 inch.  (This is helpful when watering the plant, gives the water somewhere to sit while it slowly absorbs into the dry soil.  Otherwise, you are dealing with super slow absorption and have to stand there slowly pouring tiny amounts of water onto the soil, watching it absorb in before you add more.)

A couple close-ups of this beautiful red-veined, variegated leaf pattern!

 
I think this plant will do well near a window, in a cluster of other plants where humidity should be a little bit better.  I'm still trying to think up some solution to increasing humidity around these clusters.

Orchid Surprise!

I hope I am not jinxing it when I make this post, but today I spotted a new spike!

There are a number of new roots shooting out of this orchid, but you can see the one towards the top in between a few leaves is the spike.  It's hard to see in photo, but the roots have a silvery coating and a more textured surface.  The spike is smoother and definitely solid green.

I had received this orchid as a gift either this past May or last May, I think.  It had two spikes in bloom at the time.  I'm not great at keeping orchids in ideal flowering conditions, but I am hopeful that this one will come to fruition - and if it does, I won't move it!!

Polk Dots Enter Hibernation Mode

This may be the second winter for some of these plants.  I am finding that when the nights get colder and sunlight is fleeting, these plants will bunker down into very dense, low, furry clusters until the winter passes.  Sometimes the long stems from the summer's growth will brown and drop all of its leaves, and sometimes they will hang onto their color and leaves.  However, with this plant, it is so stringy in shape and fickle with its leaves, that it is quite messy.  So, I have decided to prune them back even though some of the stems were still green.

Below is a "before" photo where you can see the stringy-ness of the plants and how much of the green is long since gone.  What you don't see is the pile of wilted leaves and blooms that have drifted into a pile on the floor - such a messy plant!

The stem on the right has a lot of green left on it yet, so I left it on for now.  Additionally I don't think it quite had the furball mass of dense foliage at its base like the others do, so I should probably leave something attached to help it generate energy.

Ugh, this just looks like a gangly mess.  But you can see the short dense furballs at the bottom quite nicely.  I'm not sure why they have almost no green in them, could be just an energy conservation sort of thing for the winter.

Some of the stems had furball growth at the ends.  I am taking this as a sign that I should experiment in propagation.  I'm snipping off some of these ends and setting them in water.  I don't know if they'll take to that strategy of propagation, but we'll find out soon enough.

Here's another furball at the end of a long stem:

...and the after shot!  Like I said, a couple stems were still quite green, so I let them stay to help feed the plant during this draining season.  It looks much better, although that begonia in the middle is driving me nuts.  I think it just hates that stinking plastic pot.  I'll see if I can find something better for it this weekend.

Here's a shot of the three lucky clippings that may one day grow into their own little clusters.

I've set them in a shot glass of tap water, making sure no leaves are in the water and attempting to get as much stem submerged as possible.

Another angle..

I'll check in on these every couple weeks and hopefully will have something good to report soon!