Friday fun: Which plants do you cultivate?

[Pavel Junek]

Hey everyone!

It's friday and we have new fun article here!

My name is Pavel and I work as an Atlassian System Administrator in the Czech Republic. 

Besides Atlassian products my big hobby is plant growing, especially the carnivorous ones. Maybe you know these from the book "The Night of the Triffids" (my plants are, of course, smaller and harmless (big grin)). In the Czech Republic we have our own similar movie "Adéla ještě nevečeřela" ("Dinner for Adele"), where the main character is a plant, which is like the Triffids (eating people (big grin).

                                                        

This is real carnivorous plants :-)

         

I've started with orchids growing recently, which can bloom in every season.

What is your favorite type of plant to grow?

PS: I am also beer-lover and home brewer! The Czech Republic is known as a paradise for beer lovers (you know the brands like Pilsner Urquell [Plzeň] or original Budweiser Budvar [Budějovický Budvar] for sure). I follow the article Friday Fun: What's your favourite beer/drink :-))

Have a fun friday!

Pavel

[Alice M]

My go-to indoor plant is schefflera.  They are super easy to grow and they get gigantic if you put them in a big pot.  About a year ago, on a whim, I bought a tiny maidenhair fern, since I'd seen so many beautiful ones out in nature on California hikes.  I'd heard how delicate and fragile they are, so I've been very conscientious about watering and spritzing her regularly.  She has flourished!  She went from being fist-sized to almost 4' across!  Oh, yes, and she has a name ... Cassandra.  We call her Cassie.  She is the best!

[Pavel Junek]

Coool! :-)

[Alice M]

I tried to take some pix of Cassie, but it's not easy where we have her perched by the window.  Plus, the beauty and magic of Maidenhair ferns is that they sway and move so easily in even the tiniest of breezes.  Such graceful motion.  It makes her seem almost sentient, which is why she got a name and the scheffleras don't have names.  It's impossible to capture that in a photo.

[Pavel Junek]

It is a pity, that you didn't take a picture of it, I'd like to see it! :-)

[Billy Poggi AUG NOVA_ DC]

My wife and I had a house plant once.  It died from lack of water.

We then got a cactus.  It also died from lack of water.  

We then decided to not have a plant, as it took much effort.  

So we got a small little zen pool, that would trickle water over some pebbles to make a nice background sound in the family room.  

It died.  

From lack of water.  

We couldn't even water a machine.  

...and this is why we make our children take a bath EVERY NIGHT!! 

:)

[Scott Theus]

Great question! 

I currently have 4 plants at my desk at work. Allow me to introduce you to Spike (Sago Palm,) Gary (Gardenia,) Shamus (Shamrock,) and Bob (Peace Lilly.)

[Stephanie Grice]

WOW! Awesome.

[Monique vdB]

I love that second one! It's a Gardenia? So cool!!!

[Pavel Junek]

Wow! The Shamrock is very cool!

[Mandy Ross]

love this question! 

I have a pretty big garden and a ton of indoor plants that I'm constantly separating into new plants, so the list of things I grow is really, really long. But if I have to pick my favorites I'll do it by section.

In the veg bed: eggplant. they have gorgeous purple flowers that develop into many different types of fruit, and are fairly hardy. they are also tasty! (I have several tried and true eggplant recipes!)

In the flower bed: hostas. it's so fun in the spring when they poke their weird little hornlike leaves out of the ground and turn into huge plants with lovely stems of purple flowers. when they're up, its a sign that the weather isn't getting cold again for awhile.

in the orchard: quince. they control the root system of pear trees, are super hardy, and produce fruit that are inedible unless cooked with a lot of sugar - but if you do, it's one of the most delicious things you'll ever eat (extra good with manchego cheese!)

indoors: my prolific peace lily. I was given two of them in 2008 and they've since propagated into 16 individual plants! I am still separating out babies so if anyone has any pots they don't need, i'm in the market! (also anyone need a peace lily?)

[Fabian A. Lopez (Community Leader - Argentina, Florida, California)]

You are the champion!!

[Pavel Junek]

Incredibly! So many different plants! :-)

[Mike Rathwell]

When the kids became grown up and gone, we sold the big house and bought a small one with a "zero lot line" yard. Having had enough of the big yard and its care, I had the whole thing done in pavers. I installed drip watering under it with risers every 10 ft to attach hoses for drip emitters for plants in pots on two different circuits; one for longer watering duration and one for shorter.

So... aside from a couple of SMALL areas that aren't potted plants, everything IS in pots and all of them are watered automagically.

Given that we are in SoCal and water can be in short supply, I slowly kept dialing back the durations while increasing the days between watering cycles. Everything that didn't survive got replaced by succulents.

This has made for a rather stunning outdoor landscape... Succulents are rather cool looking plants in the first place and when one has more water on them than they get in nature (but still far less than non-succulents) they grow like... weeds... In the space of ~1yr, larger pots I have that started with a few inexpensive plants in 4" pots have grown into lush, huge explosions of growth that are the equivalent to "pre-made" pots at the nursery costing hundreds of dollars.

The rather low effort for all this greatly pleases my indolence as well.

[Pavel Junek]

Succulents are great, I like them too!

[Jimmy Seddon]

This is a great Friday fun post!  Personally, I don't grow anything unless I intend to eat it.

I have a vegetable garden that is always growing each year.  The main things my wife and I grow are: Lettuce, Carrots, Green Beans, Tomatoes, Radishes, Squash and Cucumbers.

The goal is to have all the sides for at least one meal in the summer made completely from items we have grown ourselves. 

[Pavel Junek]

That's the right approach! Benefit from every plant :)

[Monique vdB]

A couple of years ago I started pot gardening with succulents in my yard. I had to schedule weekend watering but it worked great! Until we had like three months of rain in a row and I got totally out of the habit and then it stopped raining and everything died. But I kept them alive for like two years which was HUGE for me, since I am a plant-killer. 

This summer we are having our garden landscaped and there is an irrigation system happening and an app to manage it all. Our landscaper is going to teach us all about it and I hope it will require no effort at all to have a beautiful yard. And in the meantime I will go back to the succulent store and replace all my potted plants and try again...

[Mike Rathwell]

@Monique vdB that is exactly the approach I took. I started out with the above noted irrigation lines with risers to water pots and a simple irrigation timer and since went the route of a smart one (Orbit B-Hyve which, so far is the only one I've found with a small amount of stations). My "gardening" became only that I chose to do; replacing or refreshing for a different "style" or to add something new. The rest of it... just takes care of itself.

Succulents rule.

[Pavel Junek]

Keep one's fingers crossed, let the plants grow!

[Shannon S]

This topic is right up my alley! :D 

That film sounds a lot like the movie Little Shop of Horrors, where the famous line "Feed me, Seymour!" came from. I never saw the original 1960 version, but the version from 1986 stars Rick Moranis (Seymour) and Ellen Greene (Audrey). He starts having to kill people for the plant known as Audrey II and the police start poking around. 

As for my own plants, I have over 100 inside my house, mostly aroids. When I was a kid back in Delaware, I used to grow many plants in my room, but it was mostly maple trees, sunflowers, spider plants, and Syngonium.

When I moved to Amsterdam, my first apartment seemed to kill any plant I would buy. We recently bought a new house, and they just love it there that all the plants I have bought haven't died. I'd like to share a few here. (But not all 100+.)

Here is my Ficus elastica, also known as a rubber tree. This variety is called the Belize. I ordered a much smaller one, but the shop delayed my order as they weren't able to get a suitable one for me. A few months later, they sent me this monster. It's three separate plants in one pot! My concern for this plant is that the white parts can't collect chlorophyll, so they tend to turn brown unless they get very bright light.

And here is my Anthurium clarinervium. The roots of this thing are massive. I've since moved the plant to a smaller pot, but it had to sit in this big one for a while until I found a smaller size. It's grown exactly one leaf in the few months since I got it.

I'd love to share photos of my philodendrons (Imperial Red, Pink Princess) but I, unfortunately, don't have very many good pictures of them.

[Pavel Junek]

Ficus elastica looks amazing, I can also buy it. :-)

[A.]

I'm horrible at growing plants but I've recently brought home this little sansevieria golden hahnii. Hopefully, it won't die!

[Shannon S]

Don't water it except when you remember once a month or two, and then just toss it some lukewarm water. They hate their feet to be wet and will rot. It's beautiful!

[A.]

@Shannon S thank you! Its low maintenance is the main reason I got it :D

[Teodora V _Fun Inc_]

A few years ago, the only thing I could successfully grow was mold. 

I think the change happened because I needed to care for something (we are not allowed to have animals in our rental apartment), and I also love the touch of nature. I keep everything, like home equipment and clothing in the black/white/grey gamma, and I wanted to have something fresh, alive, and beautiful.

I killed a few plants at the beginning (have to mention here that my mom was always afraid to let me watering her flowers). Then the hours of reading and the slow steps in gardening started to show some progress. 

Now I have about 5 indoor plants and 4 pots at my balcony.

My greatest success so far is with the Cyclamen flower - it's supposed to bloom only 1 or 2 months a year, and mine is now blooming for a year and a half without intentions to stop! 

@Pavel Junek I think carnivorous plants are awesome, some time ago I wanted to have one, but I've heard that if you try to grow them inside, they smell bad. 

I see that yours are planted outdoors?

[Pavel Junek]

Most carnivorous plants like to be outside in the summer, but they don't mind being on the windowsill at all!

They only need a lot of sun and a lot of water. Try it, see how they grow :)

[Jodi LeBlanc]

Wow that photo of the 5 lined up on your balcony looks like a painting, so colourful and beautiful! My first apartment we weren't allowed pets, and Jerry and I thought that meant cats and dogs. One day he brought home two green singer finches. We adored them and they would echo back our whistles. Turns out the apartment manager meant all pets, oops! Anyways we worked it out and our finches were able to stay with us thankfully. Or else we would have been moving if we had to give them up.

[Teodora V _Fun Inc_]

I'm dreaming welsh corgies all night long, because of the manager's rules :) I'm hoping that one morning I will wake up and the corgi won't disappear haha.

[Yevhen Rohovets]

I like cacti. They are unpretentious, they are beautiful and no cat can chew them) In addition, if you have a cactus at work, you automatically become both a serious and creative person, I love cacti.

[Monique vdB]

"if you have a cactus at work, you automatically become both a serious and creative person" -- @Yevhen Rohovets I love this!

[Yevhen Rohovets]

Thank you, use it)

[Pavel Junek]

Cactus is good, its biggest advantage is that you can forget about watering :-D

[Jodi LeBlanc]

Too funny! I am going to get a cactus right away just for that serious and creative persona :)

[Monique vdB]

I asked a friend of mine for help decorating and she recommended some indoor plants. Since, again, I kill most plants, she said artificial ones were okay. And they have come a long way! Here is my orchid, Fakey McPlastic! She's lovely. 

[Pavel Junek]

I also have orchids at home now.

Here are my orchids, together:

[Teodora V _Fun Inc_]

They are gorgeous!

[Jodi LeBlanc]

Wow the orchids are stunning! I have an orchid that bloomed for 6 months, but now it is just leaves. Hoping it will go for a third round of blooms.

[Monique vdB]

Oh sure, steal Fakey McPlastic's thunder 🤣🤣🤣

[Jodi LeBlanc]

Awesome Friday Fun post! I have about 10 plants at a time, I do my best to give them water, sunlight/shade, vitamins and repot them when they grow. When a plant is not doing well I send it to my friend's house, she adopts sick plants and brings them back to life a true plant whisperer.

This year for my outdoor plants I added a card to my Agile Household board called Summer plants 2019. I added the pics of all the plants after they were planted and will take more photos at the end of the summer to show their growth. I also added the sticks that are in each plant with the names in case I want to buy (or not buy the same ones) next year without having to try to remember. I only have 6 outdoor pots but I can see this being great for those that do the full gardens and tons of plants.

[Jodi LeBlanc]

Here is a pic of a few of my plants. The three of them were just repotted. I had the money tree since it was a baby, and it may almost be too big. Not sure if I should cut it down and see if it will regrew, or let it grow to the size of a floor plant.

[Jodi LeBlanc]

@Monique vdB I put this pic in for you as I know you love cardinals! Just to clarify, it is hand carved wood, not taxidermy!!

[Teodora V _Fun Inc_]

The window view is so beautiful!

[Jodi LeBlanc]

Thank you @Teodora V _Fun Inc_ so grateful to still have that tree. A branch was broken last summer during a tropical hail storm, we thought we were going to lose the tree, but gratefully it bounced back - nature is so resilient!

[Alex Laycy]

Great post!

Some of my current collection (it's slowly turning into an obsession) - not the ideal spots, but so far so good! 😄

[Jason H]

I have tried several times to grow passionfruit in my back yard.

• My first attempt ended when my 1 year old puppy bit through the trunks of the vines.
• My second attempt ended when local rats ate through the trunks of the vines.
• My third attempt (after letting the roots from the second attempt regrow) ended when local rats ate all of the leaves of the vines.

I think I've seen enough signs. No more passionfruit vines for me.

[Zak Laughton]

I recently planted seeds from a dragonfruit I bought at a grocery store. About 6 months in, they're doing quite well!

[Frank McGuire]

Hey, they are perfect! As far as I understood right, which lights do you use here and what about power? 40W? To my mind, it's very necessary to them as a soil too. I'd recommend you increase light output to 70W min. Here is a professional article about it  We are growing succulents like Euphorbia and Monadenium and proud of it. Unfortunately, can't upload pics atm. 

[Zak Laughton]

Thanks for the tip! I'm not sure what light we were using. It's this generic grow light from Amazon, and I'm not sure if the power output was specified. Unfortunately, they all died when we lost power in the recent winter storm in Texas. Apparently, they don't like freezing temperatures 😂. I'll keep this in mind when I try to grow more, though!

[Jack Nolddor [Sweet Bananas]]

I used to take care of 150 plants (most of them cactus) before moving to here Madrid.

Some of them are still with me :)

[Pavel Junek]

Cool! :-)

[Frank McGuire]

Oh my!