thankyou very much for your invitation to say what grows in southern Western Australia, I felt I had to edit and rewrite etc, but will never get around to that! so here goes. What grows well, and what I love are clivias, cymbidium orchids. What grows easily, and I tend to disregard, which I shouldn't, are crocosmia, ismene? inca lilies, alstroemeria, hippeastrums, daffodils. What are classed as weeds are watsonia, arum lilies. I do grow (easily) the coloured calla lilies (and still like arum lllilies). The cymbidium orchids live out under the gum trees ( of what my favourite are the lemon gums), in pots on raised wire . We can have hail, which damages the leaves, also on my clivia plants. I also love vireya rhododendrons, which grow slowly, and still am experimenting with these. I grow red roses and dutch hybrid alstroemerias as cutflowers, and love doing wedding bouquets, etc, I also do silver (and sometimes gold) jewellery for the brides. I am trying to turn my love of gardening and arrangements into a business (as long as I get some extra gardening money thats OK!). Little pink bulbous flowers (their name evades me) grow amongst the conifers in one area of the garden Oxalis! (even though they are weeds, I keep them - they suppress the weeds and look pretty in spring). We love the Blue spruce (ours are about 2 foot tall and are about 5 years old). My son visited Canada and saw the real thing! Envious! I love growing clematis, the montanas grow easily, the large flowered hybrids grow OK if protected from the hot winds. Temperature is from 0 deg C (freezing point) to some summers an odd day above 43deg C and everything dries up horribly, especially if it is windy too. But mostly Albany is a green place, with lots of good water (something lacking in Australia). I can send seeds of hippeastrums if you like ( my mother in law always seems to get hers to flower). Information is very welcome, I enjoy the group. Cheers Angela ----- Original Message ----- From: <johngrimshaw@tiscali.co.uk> To: Pacific Bulb Society <pbs@lists.ibiblio.org> Sent: Wednesday, November 02, 2005 3:40 PM Subject: [pbs] Western Australia? > Angela, > > I'm sure we would all be fascinated to know about the bulbous plants that > you can grow in Albany, and about any interesting wild geophytes in that > wonderfully diverse area. I know that the Australian flora doesn't 'do' > bulbs much, but there are lots of geophytic orchids, Drosera etc. > > John Grimshaw > > Dr John M. Grimshaw > Garden Manager, Colesbourne Gardens > > Sycamore Cottage > Colesbourne > Nr Cheltenham > Gloucestershire GL53 9NP > > Website: http://www.colesbournegardens.org.uk/ > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Angela and Dean Offer" <angelasgarden@bigpond.com> > To: "Pacific Bulb Society" <pbs@lists.ibiblio.org> > Sent: Tuesday, November 01, 2005 9:09 AM > Subject: Re: [pbs] Saffron - rejected messages > > > > I find the group very interesting also, you missed my point. I should have > > said bulbs and climate and saffron and other plants, I love them all. > Sorry > > I am just complaining about boring emails that talk about none of these > > things. > > ----- > _______________________________________________ > pbs mailing list > pbs@lists.ibiblio.org > http://www.pacificbulbsociety.org/list.php >