Homegrown Hamilton ladyslippers

[cnycharles]

Recently I went to the Bruce Peninsula to find calypso bulbosa and get some pictures. On the way back I stopped by John M's on the edge of hamilton ontario. Along his front drive he has a long bed of yellow and showy ladyslippers! You could smell them there were so many yellows in bloom!


Cyp pubescens, weaker planting, view along whole bed


Showy ladyslipper sprouts


Southern small yellow ladyslippers var parviflorum


The healthy pubescens planting


Var parviflorum


Big undivided clump of pubescens


This is Charlie! Very energetic...


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[NYEric]

Very nice. Were there a lot of bees around?

 

[KyushuCalanthe]

Wow, fantastic!

 

[cnycharles]

It was quite a sight to see! Very healthy plants. I don't remember seeing very many bees around...
I'll let John give details about his cyps and all that


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[JAB]

WOW!! That is a dream driveway!

 

[Don I]

I'm speechless.
Don

 

[abax]

OMG that's just fantastic!!! I'm rather speechless myself.
The chicken wire is such a great idea to keep critters from
digging up the plants. The leaves look immaculate with
no slug/snail damage. How'd you manage that John?

Hey Charlie, you handsome devil you!!!

 

[John M]

Thanks for posting Charles. The close-up of the dark parvi is really nice!

Thanks for the nice comments everyone.

Eric, the fragrance is very noticeable; although gentle, not harsh. You'd think it would attract bees; but, so far I've not seen any near the Cyps. In fact, I've seen VERY few bees at all this year. So far, I've seen maybe 3 or 4 Bumble Bees and no Honey Bees, even though there is an Apiary only about 1 km away.

Usually, including last spring, my greenhouse is full of bees in the spring, that come in the back vent. They always go for the big Cattleyas and often pollinate quite a few of them. This year, there was none of that. I've commented to a few people this spring that I haven't been seeing any bees.

Normally, about 1/4 or 1/3 of all the Cyp flowers get pollinated. I collect the seeds in the fall, mix them with sand and go walking in good Cyp habitat broadcasting handfulls of sand/seeds all over the place. I think that this year I may have to do some pollinating myself. I'm just not seeing any bees at all this year.

Angela, I've never had trouble with slugs going after my Cyps. I have never put down bait because they've never been a problem. The chicken wire is to stop the Chipmunks from digging up the freshly replanted dormant roots, which they do with enthusiasm. The freshly disturbed soil seems to attract them. However, this spring I have had a lot of trouble with Chipmunks ripping off the pouches and biting off whole flowers! I've been using two live traps since the Cyps began to bloom. I've caught and relocated 12 Chipmunks so far.

Angela; Charlie says "Woof!":wink:

 

[paphioboy]

Wow! Fantastic! :clap::clap::clap: What mulch is it that you use, John? Looks like CHC to me..

 

[JAB]

No bees = No bueno! Not a good sign for mother earth

 

[John M]

Yes, paphioboy. It's small size CHC. The beds are filled with ProMix HP with about an inch or two of CHC.

Yeah, no bees is a concern!

 

[fundulopanchax]

What a magnificient display of Cyp's!

 

[abax]

I hadn't considered chipmunks. We have many,
many of them, but they usually stay around the
feeders and don't bother anything else.

The absence of bees worries the hell outta me.
There should be lots of honey bees around my
daylilies and I've seen carpenter bees, but no
honey bees this year. Both my sister-in-law and a niece have hives fairly close to us. I agree with JAB that if the honey bees go so do
we. Come to think of it, we have lots of trees blooming in the nursery fields and I don't see or
hear any around them.

 

[phrag guy]

That is amazing John,whish I was there to see and enjoy the fragrance,I go out and smell mine all the time.

 

[Wendy]

Those are awesome John! That patch grows so much every year.

Bees....here we have no problem. When our two apple trees and the pear tree were in bloom the trees 'buzzed' from the amount of bees. There were honey bees, bumble bees, carpenter bees and those icky yellow jackets. But the honey bees outnumbered all of them.

 

[John M]

Thanks everyone.

Yes Angela, the lack of bees can become a HUGE issue for us all if populations crash everywhere. Let's hope it's just local anomaly.

Wendy, now I remember you telling me that about your fruit trees. Odd that we would each have such different bee numbers this year; but, good news. Perhaps the issue is just local in my area, for some reason? I wonder what it could be? I've never seen a spring season with so few bees.

 

[Markhamite]

Very beautiful! Really amazing looking plants and flowers.

 

[SlipperFan]

Wow!

 

[cnycharles]

One thing to note about bee keepers and not seeing bees around; I was reading on a south Florida honey producer's website where they filled an 18 wheeler with hives and headed to California to pollinate almond groves! If your neighboring apiarists are of any size they may be taking their bees elsewhere at times for pollination


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[John M]

Good point, Charles. However, I believe this Apiary's focus is on honey production. Their product is in all the local stores and they have a little retail storefront in the front room of their house in Carlisle. I think it is a small family business that wouldn't be large enough to rent out hives to orchards. However, I'll ask the next time I go over to re-fill my honey jar.