Today's weather - sunny
This pink Arundina was planted at the Indian Garden but mine at home finally sent out a new shoot after so many months of growing it since I bought it at last year's World Orchid Conference in Nov 11. To me, I am not as amazed by this colour variety then the more common white-purple A. graminifolia (common name: Bamboo Orchid).
Back to this post, I am actually posting the beautiful plants at the Hub, which is also known as the rose. It is no coincidence that the flowers have a pink tinge or shade. These spectacular plants are namely as follows:
- Plumeria 'Dwarf Singapore Pink'
- Ceiba speciosa (common name: Silk Floss Tree)
- Rondeletia leucophylla or Arachnothryx leucophylla (common name: Panama Rose)
- Plumeria rubra variegated
- Vinca rosea or Catharanthus roseus (common name: Periwinkle)
The pink Calanthe finally sent up a new bud since the WOC in November last year. I will post more photos of the developing inflorescence soon! This hobby can really be very rewarding.
Today's weather - sunny
This is a much delayed post. Like I mentioned in the post on the Phaius I purchased at the WOC, I realized that I forgot to post anything on the Sarawak (Kuching) trip I went in early March this year. So here goes.
The flight took off around 8:43 am and we reached the Sarawak airport at around 10:36 am. The first thing I saw was the Old Town White Coffee outlet and it reminded me of Mark Lee.
The roadscape reminded me of West Malaysia's landscape. The hotel we stayed in was so posh and I think it was the best hotel I ever stayed in thus far. From the room, I could see the Sarawak river.
We set off soon after and along the way, saw lots of Nepenthes species (Pitcher Plants) growing in its natural habitat along the road. They were all so beautiful and came in all sorts of shapes and sizes. The inflorescences of separate male and female flowers were also prominently on display. I particularly like the compact N. ampullaria type of rosette pitchers.
I bought most of these plants during the recent WOC. They are mostly orchids which include the variegated Phalaenopsis amabilis cultivar, Calanthe cultivars, variegated Dendrobium cultivar, Phaius tankervilliae and variegated Phaius tankervilliae, Cymbidium cultivars and variegated Cymbidium cultivar and a pink Arundina graminifolia (from Vietnam).
Sadly, the Calanthe inflorescence dried up but the two plants are otherwise healthy looking. The variegated Dendrobium was to replace the one, which I purchased from the last SGF, that died a few months ago. I saw the beautiful Phaius on my March Sarawak trip this year and suddenly realized that I forgot to post about this fantastic showy terrestrial orchid on my blog when I couldn't find any trace of it. Interestingly, I managed to buy a variegated form of it too. This show saw me buying lots of Cymbidium cultivars and some of the photos are posted below. I bought on the last day and hour of the WOC, three bags of variegated Dianella for merely $10, which in my opinion was a good bargain. There is also an unknown pink flower orchid that I bought, which I think could be another Calanthe.
As for the red Gerbera, I bought it from Ikea but unfortunately, the plants rotted away at the base and I just threw it away today. If I remember correctly, I purchased the variegated Ficus from Giant. Then there was the small leaved Tibouchina which started to produce lots of floral buds and eventually purple flowers after I planted it into the planter. One thing I don't really like about the latter is that it tends to shed some of its leaves very easily but the good thing is it is relatively free flowering under the less than ideal semi-shade conditions.
