Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day - March, 2014

Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day is hosted by May Dreams Gardens. Be sure to follow the link to check out what's blooming in other (actual) gardens around the world! I do hope Carol doesn't mind my contaminating her meme with indoor plants. 

Pickings have gotten a bit slim as I have sent about half of my indoor plants home to my parents ahead of my move at the end of the month. The rest should be OK for the 7 days it will take the truck to drive across the country. Hopefully there aren't anymore freak outbursts of winter weather along the way!

Porphyrocoma pohliana, also known as Brazilian fireworks, rose pine, and a host of other names, may also be known under the scientific name Justicia scheidweileri. The taxonomists are apparently still duking it out over this one. It's a beautiful little foliage plant, perfect for planting around the base of leggy plants. As an added bonus, it forms these fantastic little pagoda-shaped red bracts that will shoot out tubular purple flowers. It also reseeds a little, so you can buy one and let it sow around to fill out the pot. It is tropical, so use it as a summer annual or as a houseplant. 

Next is my Ludisia discolor, the most common of the "jewel orchids." This has been blooming for over a month now. See my February GBBD. The oldest flowers are just starting to look a bit faded. After blooming, I plan to cut it back hard to let the new shoots forming at the base take over and make it look less sprawling.

Rhododendron 'Periwinkle', a tropical vireya hybrid, continues to put out a few blooms at a time. Some of these flowers are the same as the ones in my February post! They are such bright flowers, I can't believe I waited so long to try vireyas!

Finally, Aglaia odorata, or Chinese perfume plant, has tiny yellow flowers only 2 or 3 millimeters in diameter, but even this one tiny inflorescence emits a lovely perfume akin to citrus flowers (a little lighter and less cloying, but just as powerful). This is supposed to be one of those fool-proof, tough plants, but my small starter grew very slowly for me at first. It's just gotten established and started growing well in the last month or so. Hopefully the move doesn't upset it too much and it will continue to grow and produce more flowers! I really want this to become a nice, full specimen with enough flowers that I don't have to stick my nose right on top of the one cluster of tiny blooms (though it's still worth it). As with all my blooming plants this month, this is a houseplant, though it's happy to summer outdoors as long as you watch out for spider mites.

I can't wait to get back home so I can share pictures of my actual garden! (Though it might take a while to whip it back into some semblance of respectability.)

Until next time...