Friday, November 07, 2008

Back with my Indoor Garden

I have neglected to post for a while now, which was duly noted by some readers! The outdoor world is cold and snowy, so what is a gardener to do other than travel to some warmer and milder location? Yes, I abandoned my northern garden to go browsing though Vancouver's lush green gardens at the end of October.
Fushia in bloom at the Queen Elizabeth Park, Vancouver:

It was like reliving September in my garden. The mums looked marvelous, the Japanese maples wore crimson leaves, and the only thing coming from the sky was occasional rain.
Quarry garden at the Queen Elizabeth Park, Vancouver:

Bonsai trees at the Buddhist temple in Richmond, BC.

On a very exciting note, I picked up two new orchids. Both are tropical ladyslippers and fairly hard to find: Paphiopedilum bellatulum and Paph. charlesworthii. I was excited to get these labeled species orchids from a kind lady selling them at Vancouver's Granville Island Public Market. If you ever visit Vancouver, you must spend at least half a day at Granville Island (hardly an island, but definitely a shopping/arts/crafts/food paradise). As it turns out, this lady travels to the Saskatoon garden show each spring and sells bare root orchids at a booth. I think I bought one of her orchids in Saskatoon two years ago! It's definitely a small world. Unfortunately, the spotted orchid's leaves show some damage now, likely from cold sometime on the last day of travel. Hopefully it survives.

My basement orchid collection contains this nice group of Dendrobium nobile "Angel Smile". They keep multiplying like the stray dogs on our street and I hope some caring, plant-friendly folks will volunteer to take some off my hands.

We visited the two grizzly bears kept in a natural habitat near the top of Grouse Mountain. They were oblivious to the onlookers. One was busy digging a cave while the other looked on with seeming amusement.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow, snowed in already? Here in Seattle, it's just rain rain rain rain for the past few days with no letup. Glad you got down to Vancouver, that's one of my favorite cities on earth! I've never visited the Buddhist Temple, that's going on the list for next time. Nice post!

Anonymous said...

No wonder you need a break with all that snow. It's always a good feeling to approach someone at a stall and find a really interesting plant instead of the usual average offerings.

Anonymous said...

We had a good sized dump of snow this week but it melted the next day. My children enjoyed playing in it though, and I always enjoy watching the storms. I was born in Vancouver - I'm pretty sure there are pictures somewhere of me as a toddler, running about in that very park!

quu said...

We have -10 celsius degrees at the moment, but just one cm of snow..

Is Kona waiting snow? My cat Tassu loves to catch snowballs..

Hugs from Finland

-quu-

Barbarapc said...

Just what a girl needs this time of year - nice green & flowers. Amazing finding your orchid gal on Granville Island!

Clayton said...

Nice to see you back and posting pictures. My wife is trying to grow orchids here but so far just great leaves. There is some new info on my blog as we have finally gotten to sit for a few minutes today.

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