Plants that are doing well this year

[Andrew in Germany]

A companion post to the posting of plants that elude me, I’m happy about some plants that are doing better than usual this season.

Tetrapanax papyrifera T-rex although not especially tall ( about 2.5 m ) it’s shape has come of age. Some pics of course…





also Triarrhena lutarioriparia in the background has gone from 0 to 3 m in no time, and if I can keep it watered in this dry heat we’re having, then by the end of the season, Nov/Dec it’ll be a bushy 4+ meters. Canna Stuttgart has also been growing very well without the usual variegated burning.



I took these pics at 10:30pm tonight and the light is starting to dwindle, so not the cleanest clearest pictures, but I hope they do some justice. There are a few more plants doing better than usual but this view caught my attention tonight.

[MartinNicklin]

Certainly does look great Andrew. A very nice composition. I have Canna Stuttgart in the greenhouse. I’ve seen internet pics of some fabulous clumps. A good alternative for those of us who cannot afford the variegated Musa plants you need a mortgage for. However, mine refuses to bulk up. Three years and still just two stems.

Same story with my Triarrhena. Advice here was not to plant it in the garden for fear of it running riot. Mine reached the roof of the house last year but in its third year still only 4 stems. I might risk planting it out. Presently it’s in a massive pot (I’d say about 80 litres) and I’ve seen them on the net as lovely dense plants crammed into very small pots. I wonder if this is the issue, though in the ground it will be in the biggest pot if all!

Not the same story with Tetrapanax. As high as the house and pushing up everywhere. In fact, it has become a menace. I was shocked to see the prices demanded by some of the most well known nurseries for really quite small plants plunged into massive pots (and I mean prices going into the £ hundreds … for a plant which is a menace).

[Chad]

Inspiring pictures Andrew.

I think the Triarrhena lutarioriparia has been universally accepted now as Miscanthus lutarioriparius. Indeed, Kew don't even recognise the Triarrhena as a synonym.

Has anyone tried letting it loose and unbounded?

Chad

[AndyC]

No Chad, and I would be too scared to give it complete freedom.
I planted mine within a root barrier (a circle of 0.9M diameter) in late 2022. The spring of 2023 saw the new shoots circling around the perimeter of the barrier, it has now pretty much filled the space with shoots.
The tallest stems are now nearly 4.5M tall.


About a month ago the wind knocked over one of the new stems which had a couple of adventitious roots near the base of the stem. I potted it up in a 2L pot and within 2 weeks it had filled the pot with roots and started to produce side shoots from a couple of nodes on the stem.

If you would like some, I will knock off another stem and pot it up for you (the other one is at Fox Rosehill).

[Andrew in Germany]

Has anyone tried letting it loose and unbounded?

Chad

I did. Just after I bought it, a long time ago. In the space of a few months hard nosed runners were forcing their way under the roots of large trees with growing points springing up all over. I had just had a huge destructive battle digging up the rhizomes and culms of Phyllostachys vivax and the runners of Miscanthus lutarioriparius were no different, so i dug it up and put it into a large pot before it got unrepairably out of control. I bought this from Jos van der Palen at Kimmei Bamboo nursery, here in The Netherlands, and this was his warning too. Although his clump was running free in the ground, he kept digging the rhizomes/roots/culms up around the periphery as material for selling. Keeping it in check. Just a little piece will take off. Jos’s garden nursery has very fertile free draining soil and with all the bamboos he keeps everything well watered. My experience is that if it dries out in the pot for too long the culms stunt, turn brown around the leaf edges and it looks shabby and the new growth comes up short. It also likes lots of fertilizer, sun and warmth. But in the winter I have left them in pots outdoors to weather the cold and so far so good. I guess planting out in situ shouldn‘t be taken lightly without a rhizome barrier.

Certainly does look great Andrew. A very nice composition. I have Canna Stuttgart in the greenhouse. I’ve seen internet pics of some fabulous clumps. A good alternative for those of us who cannot afford the variegated Musa plants you need a mortgage for. However, mine refuses to bulk up.

Canna Stuttgart is a teaser. 20 years ago driving around the roundabouts in Provence i saw a huge clump of C Stuttgart planted out growing in all day blazing sun and looking fantastic. Watering and feeding was left up to the city workers so I wouldn’t have thought they were too well taken care of.
So I keep trying, making the same mistakes every year, taking corms out of the pots for winter and storing them dry, potting up again in the spring with new fresh compost etc. and getting a few weak stems and getting burned no matter where I put them in the garden. Last winter I just brought the whole pot into the greenhouse cut them back and left them till spring. Put the pot back outside in sun/shade and new growth has come up strong and sun resistant. Maybe they do better with less care than we think.

[MartinNicklin]

Chad I keep my pot constantly watered and fed. It is also against the south facing wall so gets sun. it has been in this pot for 3 years now and I’m just disappointed it hasn’t bulked up. Andrew your clump looks amazing and that’s what I was hoping for. I was thinking about putting it in the open ground but after reading both your comments, I won’t! I just don’t know what to do to make it more luxuriant … unless it’s my old bugbear: the compost I’ve used!





I have a Miscanthus sacchariflorus (sorry if the name is wrong Chad!) in the garden and that makes for a very attractive green fountain. This is what I expected of lutarioriparius. Photo at the end (can’t get subsequently added photos to slot into the correct space! :(. )

This is my Stuttgart in the greenhouse. After three years the same story. One main shoot and one toddler!




I might order another root next year and hope for better things.

It’s as you say Andrew, some plants elude you and others romp away with no rhyme nor reason to it.

[Andrew in Germany]

Martin, why don’t you take a piece with roots off it now and put it in a pot with some good compost and see what happens. Definitely yours is not too happy so dissecting it now won’t be too much of a loss, and who knows, the new shoot may decide to get on with it. Having 2 pots of it is better than 1 anyways and it leaves room for a bit of experimenting with position, feeding etc.

[MartinNicklin]

Yes Andrew, I think I will try that.