Garden Blog - Top Tropicals

🌸 How to grow Orchid Trees in pots

Everyone loves beautiful Orchid trees with butterfly-like leaves and colorful orchid-like flowers. They are widely used in Southern landscapes. But what if you don't have a room in your garden for another tree? Or what if it gets too cold in winter for a tropical Orchid tree? You can grow it in a pot!

📝 This is how to n enjoy the stunning flowers and foliage of Bauhinia right on your patio or balcony:

• 💠 Choose the right variety. Some species suitable for containers:

B. galpinii, B. madagascariensis, B. monandra, B. alba (candida), B. acuminata, B. bidentata, B. blakeana, B. grandidieri and many others.
• 💠 Choose the right pot: Select a large, sturdy pot with good drainage holes. Bauhinia trees have a vigorous root system
• 💠 Use a well-draining potting mix. We recommend a professional soilless mix: Sunshine Abundance.
• 💠 Sunny location: Position the pot in a location that receives full sun to partial shade. Bauhinia plants thrive in warm, sunny conditions.
• 💠 Watering: Keep the soil slightly moist but not waterlogged. Water the plant when the top inch of soil feels dry to the touch.
• 💠 Fertilizing: For the most profuse flowering like in the video, feed the Bauhinia with liquid Sunshine Boosters Megaflor year around, it's safe with every watering.
• 💠 Pruning: Prune the plant to maintain its shape and encourage bushier growth.
• 💠 Winter Care: If you live in a region with cold winters, bring the pot indoors or to a sheltered location to protect the plant from frost.

📸 Bauhinia monandra - Napoleons Plume Orchid Tree, starts flowering when only 2 ft tall and grows well in containers.

📚 Earlier posts on Bauhinias: 1 2 3
Bauhinias: trees with Orchid Flowers and Butterfly Wings

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🎭 Why Pharaoh Mask has stunning 3D effect?

• 👺 Colocasia Pharaoh Mask (tm) that we mentioned earlier is flourishing today in our garden!
• 👺 Vibrant green leaves highlighted by striking purple veins, giving a distinct 3D appearance.
• 👺 As they mature, the leaf edges curl, enhancing the purple veins. Each leaf, supported by sturdy, dark stems matching the veins' color, resembles a masquerade mask.
• 👺 A cluster of these plants creates a striking visual with its unique foliage and dark stems, standing out among other elephant ears.
• 👺 It's a must-have for any rare plant collector and is sure to be a showstopper and conversation piece!

📸 More pictures in next post

🛒 Get your own Pharaoh Mask

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🏵 TopTropicals

🍏 Why everyone wants the Sugar Apple?

Annona squamosa - Sugar apple - is considered by many as the most delicious tropical fruit. We introduced the Annona trees earlier.

• 
  ✳️ Very small, compact tree, perfect for container or small yard, see photos from our Tropical Fruit Tree contest Winner.
• 
  ✳️ Starts fruiting within 3 year from seed!
• 
  ✳️ Easy to grow and undemanding
• 
  ✳️ The fruit is sheer deliciousness, pulp resembling custard.

🛒 Order Sugar Apple

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🏵 TopTropicals

🍏 Why everyone wants the Sugar Apple?

Annona squamosa - Sugar apple - is considered by many as the most delicious tropical fruit. We introduced the Annona trees earlier.

• ✳️ Very small, compact tree, perfect for container or small yard, see photos from our Tropical Fruit Tree contest Winner.
• ✳️ Starts fruiting within 3 year from seed!
• ✳️ Easy to grow and undemanding
• ✳️ The fruit is sheer deliciousness, pulp resembling custard.

🛒 Order Sugar Apple

#Food_Forest #Container_Garden

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💰 Money-making plant for your windowsil

• Pilea peperomioides - Chinese Money Plant - is a perfect indoor plant that is famous for its lore of attracting money into your life! It is a small version of a money-making machine, in addition to the Good Luck Plant - Malabar Peanut we mentioned earlier.
• It is a highly sought-after houseplant and also known as the missionary plant, pancake plant, UFO plant.
• Known for its charming beauty and dwarf size, it is a perfect addition to the windowsill garden.
• The round, shiny, peltate leaves become mounded as the plant matures and give the appearance of large, green coins stacked on top of one another.
• Its adaptation to low light and succulent leaf structure make it an easy-care plant.

🛒 Get your own Money Plant

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🏵 TopTropicals

What happens when a gardener gets a Swiss Cheese? Swiss Cheese Plant!

• 🌿 Monstera x adansonii - Baby Swiss Cheese Plant - is an unusual form of Monstera with leaves that have many holes, much bigger than those in Swiss Cheese!
• 🌿 Makes an interesting indoor specimen, an eye stopper.
• 🌿 Shade lover, but can take some semi-shade too.
• 🌿 Can be grown outdoors in warmer climates and climbs trees or walls wherever you need a green wall.
• 🌿 Grows fast, very undemanding plant. Perfect when you need to fill space with greenery quickly.

🛒 Order Swiss Chees Plant

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💮 It's not an orchid! But it looks like orchid: Laos Silver Stripe

• 💋 Kaempferia angustifolia - Laos Silver Stripe is one of the most beautiful of all the Kaempferia Peacock Ginger cultivars. It is one of the large types.
• 💋 The plant has boldly striped leaves of green and silver.
• 💋 The flowers are orchid shaped white and purple
• 💋 Small, compact perennial, great for container culture. Deciduous in winter, like many others from Ginger family.
• 💋 Shade lover, great as exotic houseplant.
• 💋 This hard to find variety is a must for every Ginger collector.

🛒 Order Laos Silver Stripe

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Would you like a Bat Head?

The Bat Head Lily we mentioned earlier - is blooming again!

🙈 Bat Head Lily, Bat Flower, Devil Flower or Tacca Lily - is one of the most exotic and bizarre flowers along with Amorphophallus, Sausage Tree and Clitoria.

🛒 Shop Bat Head Lily Tacca

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🏡 What happened to our favorite houseplants - hoyas?

Hoyas are not forgotten! It is one of the most favorite house plants. Hoya Ban Ngong Ngoy from Thailand has a lovely fragrance!

• ♦️ Fragrance is lovely, subtle scent.
• ♦️ Strong, vigorous, fast-growing species, similar to Hoya carnosa.
• ♦️ Beautiful flowers: umbel of flowers is about 3" wide with tiny maroon stars and white frosted edges.
• ♦️ Dark green leaves have silver white flecks and darker green veining.
• ♦️ Provide a trellis or stake to manage its rambling growth.

❓ What varieties of hoya do you have in your collection? Share in comments👇

🛒 Shop Hoyas

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🌵 Stop! Don't touch! Just smell that magic fragrance... 😭

• 💠 Easter Lily Cactus (Echinopsis sp) is native to Brazil and Argentina. It is a globular cactus that produces splendid night-blooming, white fragrant flowers up to 10" long!
• 💠 Big, white or pink, fragrant blooms.
• 💠 Flowers open at night or early morning, creating a magical experience.
• 💠 Blooms last only a day or two, making each one special.
• 💠 Cool shapes: unique, spiny, ribbed bodies come in different forms and sizes.
• 💠 Easy Care: low-maintenance, very little water, lots of sunlight, and well-draining soil. Adapted to survive in harsh, dry environments, it can take both drought (obviously - cactus) and rainy seasons (like we have in Florida).
• 💠 Great for water-saving gardens and container culture.
• 💠 Many species and hybrids to collect, with a range of colors and forms.

❓ What other cactus species with fragrant flowers do you know? Share in comments👇

🛒 Order online

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