CHINESE NEW YEAR PLANTS

Chinese New Year came and went and I can't believe it has almost been a month.

Anyway, these Cockscomb and Orchid plants outside the Cloud Forest provided a picturesque landscape when it was there. It may be interesting to note that the Cockscomb, also known as Wool Flowers or Brain Celosia, is actually cultivars of Celosia cristata.

CLOUDS

Was that an apparition of a lion in the sky?

GONGORA ORCHID

This is an orchid with species or cultivars with flowers that look like a flying bird/duck. I took these photos at the Cloud Forest. In fact, it looks like a flock of flying ducks.

CLOUDS

The weather has been hot and dry recently and there are very little clouds in the sky, which is hardly sufficient to form any cumulus or cumulonimbus clouds to seed the rain. 

When would the next heavy rains come? That is apparently everyone's concern. 

CLOUD FOREST

The moss house and car

After the Christmas Sugar Mountain display in the Flower Field, the moss house and car were moved from the Flower Field to the Cloud Forest.

The house

The car with the number plate "Ananas & Berry GB-20-13"

Beautiful mushrooms

3 different species or hybrids of Slipper Orchids

The scarlet red Phragmipedium would be stunning in large numbers

The orchid Dracula diana

The Masdevallia orchid

DUSK

I just love to see the orange glow thrown off the clouds from the setting sun in the far horizon.

CLOUD FOREST - LOST WORLD

The Lost World is the highest part of the Cloud Forest and up here, there are a number of fascinating plants that never cease to amaze me, such as the following:

• Phragmipedium (Family: Orchidaceae)
• Medinilla (Family: Melastomataceae)
• Paphiopedilum (Common Name: Slipper Orchid; Family: Orchidaceae)
• carnivorous plants Sarracenia (Common Name: North American Pitcher Plant; Family: Sarraceniaceae), Pinguicula (Common Name: Butterwort; Family: Lentibulariaceae), Drosera (Common Name: Sundew; Family: Droseraceae) 
• Calanthe cultivars (Family: Orchidaceae)

CLOUD FOREST

Hugging the entrance of the Cloud Forest is a tapestry of assorted plants made up of ferns, orchids, flowering and foliage plants. And it is always a pleasure to see the flowering Neomarica gracilis (common name: Apostle's Iris; Family: Iridaceae), which like the N. longifolia is a walking Iris.

Inside the Cloud Forest are planted with a range of unusual, uncommon or rare plants to create a man-made tropical montane forest. The beautiful Tree Ferns, Magnolia and Slipper Orchid varieties all add to the allure of this picturesque landscape. Small polygonal windows at the Secret Garden frame unique views from which one can see a miniature slice of the landscape beyond the walls, thus creating an element of mystery and secrecy.