Roses And Aloes And Wind

 More wind; no gardening.  Enjoying the roses and aloes via walk arounds while awaiting better weather, which seems likely this week, if not today.  The wind hammering on the house woke me up at 3 this morning.  Nothing to do but blog. 

I moved 'Princess Alexandra Of Kent' in the spring of this year and it has improved.  The latest flower is the best ever.
'Julia Child' showing her rich late autumn color
 'Comtesse de Provence', an ungainly, awkward, disease-ravaged plant, still manages to repeat quickly. 
'Windermere', at this time of year free of Thrips and Chili Thrips, is exquisite.  

 WS2K

 'Barcelona' looked so bad this summer I thought it was a goner.  Autumn brought it back.


 An Aloe surprise:  A. aculeata is normally a summer bloomer.
 This plant, purchased late in Spring and pumped up by the grower, was probably ready to bloom in summer, but got held back by a long wait to get into the ground.  There we go: 
 Aloe cameroni has put up a forest of flower stems, but the dry November and hot dry start to December is slowing their progress.


Aloe hardyi x cameroni, same thing.

Poor Aloe hardyi is trying to bloom.  It has been overwhelmed by Aloe megalacantha on the left and Agave marmorata on the right.  Agave marmorata is preparing to bloom, so I'll be able to rescue hardyi in...a year or so.  
There's no moving hardyi for a while.
Aloe vanbalenii is also waiting for better weather.  The leaves have reddened up with the stress of producing flowers during a spell of drying heat and wind. 
Meantime the Christmas street waits, undecorated.  Weather shuts me down, too.  How are the roses managing?  

The punch line to the really annoying software issue that has been plaguing my machine for the past week occurred while I was doing this blog post.  After all my and Beloved's unsuccessful attempts to fix the problem, the software vendor, unannounced, provided an update that--SURPRISE!--fixed the problem.   

Wonder, could they do anything about the wind, too? 

Comments

  1. Your plants never cease to impress. They’re massive! And so many of them! And all so special! I hope the wind dies down soon, both for the gardeners sake and the firefighters. The windup here in the Bay Area has kicked up causing fire weather alerts. In December! In Northern California! Rain please.

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    1. Thank you! I'm planting more and more "climate appropriate" plants--makes it a whole lot easier. Nowadays "climate appropriate" means arid climate.

      The firefighters were hoping to be finished by Christmas, but that isn't going to happen. The Thomas fire may well take a month or more to control. Terrible event for that whole area, though not as tragic as the NorCal disaster in which so many more people died. Hey I though you guys got some rain up there--better than what we got: zip.

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  2. Good on the computer issue solved. Good on the roses, so many are heavily petaled. Extra good. Good on the colorful aloes, blooms and leaves.

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    1. Thanks, Jane.

      I like the crammed-full-of-petals roses, but also the five-petal ones. Maybe I just like roses.

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  3. Wow, beautiful roses, especially first one 'Princess Alexandra of Kent', but the others are beauties too. And then the Aloes, wonderful, but not to grow outside in our country. The only complaint about the weather is, that it's terrible wet. One week ago we had a lot of snow, three days later it rained cats and dogs again and now it's starting to freeze, help....... This all together is so very bad for the perennials in our gardens. But......we can do nothing, only wait for spring with fingers crossed.

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    1. Let us hope your winter will be mild, and here it will be rainy...we can hope!

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  4. Gorgeous pictures, even if the wind continues to be annoying. We're getting wind and a lot of cold at the same time... Poor plants!

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    1. Yes most the the plants are looking tired. This long period of low humidity has been hard on everything. Hopefully the wind will abate soon for you soon. It's finally calming down here in the late afternoon, and turning into a mere breeze.

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  5. Whew, glad to know your software problems were fixed. What program was it?

    Your aloes are looking great, in spite of the winds.

    The most pressing question of the day/week/month: WHEN WILL IT RAIN??? This seems very much like déja vu.

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    1. PS Elements. The Windows Creator update interfered somewhat; there was also a thought that an anti-virus update was also a problem; I tried backing out of updates, disconnecting from the Internet, and some other stuff, and none of it helped A sudden PSE update sent from Adobe fixed it. It must have been causing problems on more than my machine.

      Cannot think about that pressing question right now. Just too darn depressing!

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  6. also hoping for the wind to drop so I can get back in the garden. Need to prune along the paths.

    Hoping for better news about the fires.

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    1. They are holding on in Santa Barbara. The wind is supposed to calm for three days and the weather is cooling. We're all hoping now.

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  7. Our winds haven't been as strong as yours I don't think but they were powerful enough to carry the smell of smoke all the way from Ventura last night and this morning. Your roses are glorious! As to your Aloes, I hope I'll have a few half as nice when they mature.

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    1. Oh, smoke. Sorry to hear that, it's bad stuff. Really enjoying the roses. Still love them!

      Aloes seem to get better and better, more and bigger flower stems. Something to look forward to every year.

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  8. Just beautiful! 'Princess Alexandra' is still on my wish list. Hopefully, I will add it in the new year.

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    1. 'Boscobel' is supposed to be a good one. I'm thinking about trying that. Have not gotten much fragrance from PAOK as yet. 'Bishops Castle' has powerful good fragrance, but the flowers are smallish.

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  9. I admire your beautiful, healthy roses! Your aloes are alien wonders to my eyes. your garden does not seem too affected by the imperfect weather. ( Does anyone out there have perfect weather? I do, for brief periods!)

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