BELLE & Zita, it's your turn. I located the neat and lovely flower you guys talked about.

Now it's your turn to locate a plant on the internet . One for each of you

(1.)This one is a giant "red hot poker" or "torch lily" in the family of Tritoma . It is a jpg or gif from a park in Africa. It is a huge plant with agave type leaves & multiple flower heads, where as a regular "red hot poker" has slender leaves & a single flower head if I remember correctly.

(2.) Red (or Maroon)Elephant Ear and Black (some dark purple) Elephant Ear.

Happy hunting

[ June 11, 2002, 09:47 AM: Message edited by: Edward F Sutton ]

Ed, I have been busy locating plants in the local nursery for my new bog garden.

I haven't been here for a couple of weeks. When I do try to get in I can't, so I have just seen this tonight.

I am delighted with the finish of the bog garden I made.
I had a path of bark leading to a garden seat in the corner, and it didn't go with the greay stones I had in the bog garden. So I scraped out 3 barrow loads of bark and recycled it to the extended pathes around the 3 no dig gardens. It took 3 bags of stones to cover the rest of the garden. I chose some native grasses, and strategically placed some large rocks so the dog could not wander through.
Now it looks heaps better as it gives it continuity.

We have had such wonderful weather until this weekend, one could hardly call it winter. But the rain on Sabbath plummeted the temps. and we woke to a very heavy frost this morning with the mountains covered in a fresh blanket of snow, plus some falls on the local hills that I hike each morning.

Maybe winter has finally arrived.

I am pleased you were able to obtain the lovely plant.

Woops Linda forgot to sign out & I forgot to check.

[ June 17, 2002, 01:44 AM: Message edited by: Linda Sutton ]

Ok, now the post will show up as really me.

Hope your bog garden does well. I seem to remember a huge bog plant with stalks & leaves like a giant rubarb. Do you have any of those ?

Edward, It's called the Gunnera Plant. I love them.
In the winter they loose their leaves completely, and the remaining 'body' of the plant resembles that of a seal.

One day I noticed them as I was walking through the Botanical Gardens, they were around this large pond.
So the next day I took my girlfriend in, telling here we were going to visit the seals!
We often have a laugh over that one!

You can also get a smaller variety, and they look great in a tall pot.
Something I hope to have one day.
The bog garden looks really great now with the added grasses and extra stones, and a lovely garden seat nearby to sit and reflect on the Creator.

If my back yard were bigger, I would certainly have a Gunnera there. I almost bought one once!

Here's a link with picture, but you will need to scroll down.

http://www.msu.edu/~dru/highlands.html

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http://community.webshots.com/photo/29001344/37659300OodDpK

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A garden link about the Gunnera Plant

http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/bog/msg071506114774.html

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http://www.mooseyscountrygarden.com/plants/p3.html

Neat links Edward, just the right amount for me to cope with. Lovely sites, I can share them with my Tuesday friend today, as it is too cold here to go out and explore our world.

I had a wonderful new suprise to show her today, but it will have to wait for a warmer day.

It was snowing in the city here last night, and the main highway south is closed.
I knew friends of ours were travelling south today, so I rang them and they hadn't heard.
She has just rung now to thank me. There would be nothing worse than being stuck in snow behind a long line of traffic as we saw last night.
They showed us on TV a shot of a yellow hammerhead sitting on a snowladen branch, eating red berries. Delightful shot.

Now on to find in a sunny africa website - the giant redhot poker, or the black or the red elephant ear. maybe ???

Red & Black (deep purple) elephant ear

http://www.elephantear-caladium.com/elephantear.html

http://www.dutchbulbs.com/nbulbladyjuly2_01.html

The 2nd site (dutchbulbs) shows a black plant very similar to a bog plant I 'just had to have'. It has a yellow spike flower.

It is also frost tender, so I only have it for 1/2 the year.

I will find out the name of it next week.

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Edited your post icon only.

[ June 20, 2002, 10:20 PM: Message edited by: Daryl Fawcett ]