Hey Nev,

Love the Ice White River. I have several from that series. Shane will be here Jun 16th. As always your plants are grown to perfection.

Memorial Day here we celebrate our veterans.

All the best

HDD

Hi everyone.

HDD - Nice to hear from you again. I find the various colour changes that Neo. 'Ice White River' goes though on its way to maturity quite interesting and also the part light plays in the colour.

That picture I posted yesterday was of a plant grown in lower light than my other Ice White Rivers. Here's three more taken in the Neo. shade house.

Neoregelia 'Ice White River' pup.

Halfway to maturity

Fully mature

I have two others from the "River Series" - 'Pink River' and 'Red River' but 'Red River' is my favourite of the three.

Neoregelia 'Red River' pup

Halfway to maturity

Fully mature

All the best, Nev.

Love them all! 'Iris' reminds me of a pair of cool Bermuda shorts.

Dave beat me to it. Or "Scottish Kilt". A good name.

So,none or few of the Guzmania come in exotic colors Nev? All I see at HD are green.

Hi everyone.

Stan – I only have a few
Guzmanias so I don’t have a lot of knowledge about them or the availability of
colours. I know they are relatively easy to grow here, and like to be fed more
than my Neoregelias. They do dislike the cold weather though and if left
exposed during winter will suffer spotting due to the cold.

They are excellent plants to
bring inside as the attractive bracts which range in colour from yellow right
through shades of apricot to various shades of scarlet red, cherry red, purple
to light mauve and even pink stay in colour for many months. As for the
flowers; they are short lived and the only colour I’ve seen on my plants are either
white or yellow.

Regarding foliage colour,
although the most common is dark green, there are plants I have with light
green foliage as well as some with white variegations such as Guz. Lingulata which is a species. Another
attractive species is Guz. sanguinea
which has leaves that change in colour from green to mainly orange when the
plants flower and is a very unusual and attractive looking plant with some
having a magnificent bract/flower combination. (MY PIC)

I forgot to mention that Guz, lingulata comes in the standard form
as well as an attractive “minor” (smaller) form as well. It also comes with or without
variegated leaves and the bracts are usually scarlet red in colour although
there is also a yellow coloured Guz, lingulata var. minor and pictures of this
can be seen on the FCBS Photo Index at http://fcbs.org/pictures.htm in the species
section at number 76.

I also have another interesting
species called Guz. wittmackii which grows an inflorescence to over a metre
tall and has eye-catching orange/red bracts with contrasting white flowers. This too comes in other colours such as scarlet, deep pink, a nice pale pink/mauve combination as well as apricot and orange and these too can be seen on the FCBS Species Photo Index at number 137

As there are no specialist
bromeliad nurseries around my area most of the Guzmanias I see are in places like
Bunnings, K-Mart, Big-W and similar type stores. These are loosely referred to by growers as “commercial
hybrids” and sold with just a generic name tag of “Bromeliad”. They are
imported into the country in flasks and grown on in nurseries before being
on-sold to these stores once they flower.

They are quite eye catching
with bract colours ranging through pale pink, dark pink, mauve/pink, red, apricot,
orange and yellow, and are generally sold as “throw aways” to be used in place of cut
flowers in the home and tossed away when the colour has finished, although they
will grow on normally and produce pups with a little basic care.

I did once buy an attractive little
unnamed plant at K-Mart which caught my eye because it had light green leaves
and fine red lineation on both the upper and lower surfaces of the leaves. I
almost lost it a couple of times due to the cold, but I did survive and produced several pups, however I still haven’t got it or
any of its pups to flower for me. This doesn’t bother me greatly as it’s the foliage
colour which I find attractive and the reason I purchased it in the first place.

As for what colour range they come in, you can
check out the two following sites which will give you some idea of what is available around the world. Hybrisers such as Chester Skotak and some of the large Belgium and Dutch nurseries continue to produce new hybrids in an ever broader range of colours

https://www.google.com.au/search?q=variegated+guzmanias&rlz=1C1VFKB_enAU696AU696&espv=2&biw=1440&bih=775&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjQ8L6ylp7NAhXi56YKHUyNDXoQsAQIIQ

https://www.google.com.au/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=variegated+guzmania+imagess

By the way, what does HD stand
for?

The plants in the next five pictures were all hybrids bought from my local Bunnings, they all had generic name tags but I have since managed to get an ID for the first three

Guzmania 'Cherry Ripe'

Guzmania 'Sunny Time'

Guzmania 'Hilda'

I bought this plant because I liked the fine lineation in the leaves..........

...........which is more obvious in this close up shot

A very atractive species called Guzmania wittmackii

Guzmania wittmackii (flowers)

Guzmania lingulata variegata minior which is another species

Another species called Guzmania remyi

Finally the very interesting Guzmania sanguinea, yet another species

All the best, Nev

Hi Nev,

HD = Home Depot. It is very similar to Lowes. (In another post, you asked about Lowes.) Both are very large, home improvement stores with big garden centers. They both carry everything from lumber to tools to tile to plumbing supplies to carpet to bromeliads. :)

I LOVE inkwell! Gorgeous! That one hits my hot button. :)

Is there one called "Ice cream"? I'm sure I would love it, too.

That wittmackii is gorgeous and wacky! WOW! Instant attraction.

Carol in Jacksonville

Hi Carol - Thanks for that, I suspected that's what HD and Lowes were, similar to our Bunnings, BBC and Masters stores.

All the best, Nev.