Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Mixed start to the season

Canberra's weather has done bad things to my plants this year -everything in the hoop house (which is not so insulated as the greenhouse proper) froze with a late frosts a month ago, with anything over 5 cm tall burned right off. This ruined the first pitcher crops of the leucophylla, alata and alabamensis, although the leucos have mostly recovered and sent up nice pitchers. The giant leuco I grow has again excelled itself with another massive pitcher - I'll post a photo of it shortly. The alabamensis and alata, in comparison, both look very poor. The new pitchers coming are now being nailed by snails brought out by the wet weather we have had on and off over the last two weeks - the same weather that has prevented me photographing much of the collection yet. Hopefully, summer will sort everything out - the alabamensis and alata are autumn peaking species, so I'm not too worried.