Bloomin' Away Philo, Azalea & Lipstick.

A couple of months ago, I noticed some odd growth on a red philo I had. Mr. S thought it could be a flower, and he was right. It has taken close to three months from the first time I noticed "something", to opening up into a flower like the pic below. It's......umm......different than most flowers I see. It is a pretty cool thing to see, it's the first time in my life I have ever seen a philo flower up close and personal. And it fit so well with this post, being a flower amongst many.


The red Philo flower is probably one of the more unique flowers I have ever seen, but there are so many other plants starting to flower too, and they all need their time in the spotlight too.

I am not sure what happened with my Azalea. It finished flowering a few months back, but has since started to develop buds again. I didn't cut it back after it flowered the last time, and it didn't get a cold period at all either. Most, from what I have read should be pruned right after flowering, or you risk cutting off where it will flower next year. I have also read that they need a cold period to induce flowering, but this one never got that either. All I know is that they like a ton of water and some sun, and they stay pretty happy!


This the bi colored azalea I mentioned over at PATSP in the comments section. The one and only reason I bought this one was because it was pink and white. My other azalea has white flowers, and it isn't doing much lately. It will be interesting to see if the flowers will be like they originally were when they were drown in a greenhouse, or if they change slightly because they are now grown in windowsill conditions.



The plant pictured below, one of my Lipstick plants (Aeschynanthus) has tried to bloom before by growing a few buds here and there, but it always seemed to drop the buds or get a couple flowers at a time. This time there are buds all over the plant. I would say that half of the stems have developed buds. If every one of the buds actually make it to flower, it will be a spectacular display.