Nature's pretty clockwork

Spanish moss flowering again? Must be late October in Sydney. While you couldn't set your clocks by these plants, you could set a calendar by them. 

Here's one of the extremely tiny beauties this morning. Each flower is less than a quarter-inch (5mm) across and you would definitely miss them if you didn't go looking for them. Fortunately for Pammy and me, we know to stay on the lookout for them once October rolls around, and over the last two weeks we could see the minuscule flower buds forming.

The flower pictured above is part of this mass of Spanish moss, which is growing at almost alarming rates, dangling from the branches of our olive tree.

This unusual second location for our massed moss was forced on us by circumstances. This large wodge of old man's beard (Spanish moss's other common name) once thrived on a large grevillea shrub, which collapsed and died last year. The wire framework attached to the walls was once home to a very unproductive, and rapidly fading, passionfruit vine, and so this was our solution. It's working OK, too. Most of the Spanish moss is clinging to the wires and seems to be slowly growing. My big contribution to its health is to regularly water it with a mist spray, if there hasn't been any rain.

Finally, I've added some small strands of Spanish moss to the newly planted fern garden out at the front of our house. They're hanging in there, but it's still a bit early to tell if the Spanish moss is growing yet.

One good short-term effect of the new strands of Spanish moss in the front garden is that they will add to the spooky Halloween look that the marauding, lolly-hungry kids will hopefully like to see on October 31.

I think I might raid our big backyard stores of Spanish moss this weekend and beef up the front garden's spookiness rating ... 

I'm sure that by late October next year, all these fine whisps of moss will be thicker, longer and, if you look carefully, dotted with tiny green flowers.

Mossy imaginings

Pammy and I had such an exciting time last Friday night, as it was the opening night of the art exhibition called "31 Days" at Gallery Red in Glebe, in which Pam was one of the team of artists who all toiled like mad through the 31 days of July, producing a painting a day for those 31 days. As Pam's theme was based around a plant growing here in our garden – Spanish moss (Tillandsia usneoides) – I thought that readers of this blog would be interested to see some of the work my talented girl does, plus learn a bit about Pam's interest in Spanish moss.

Let's start things off with the most "botanical" of Pam's
pieces, this study of the minuscule flowers of the Spanish
moss plant. In real life the blooms are specks, just an eighth
of an inch long, maybe a quarter inch from side to side.
This is a watercolour, the medium she works in very
often, but she does work in a variety of media.

Here's a real-life photo of the Spanish moss blooms. If you
know this plant, you'll be able to appreciate how small these
tiny blooms are. Here in Sydney it flowers in late spring,
in late October and early November.

No, this isn't our garden! It's a photo Pam took in the expansive
grounds of an historic plantation in Natchez, Mississippi, which
is fully preserved, including not only the mansion in which the
owners lived, but also all the slave cottages, barns and other
working buildings. The huge Southern Live Oak trees there
all dripped with Spanish moss. 

Pammy has always been fascinated by this plant, and even before we went to the USA in 2011 she had imagined what it was going to look like. When we arrived at the plantation in Natchez she had one of those "this is it, this is the place that was in my dream" kind of moments. Needless to say we had an incredible day there, wandering around, taking lots of photos and just generally taking the whole ambience deep into our memories.

For the 31 Days exhibition, Pammy has created a beauitfully varied visual ode to Spanish moss, including its place in native American, Cajun and Creole cultures (for example, Spanish moss is the traditional stuffing material for voodoo dolls). And the artist in her just sees Spanish moss in different ways. Here are three more images from her show, which might give you some idea of all the different ways Spanish moss has inspired her.

This is one of Pam's voodoo dolls. On the left panel is
the basics of making one (two sticks, add moss) and
on the right is the prettiest voodoo doll in Sydney.
Virtually everyone I know thinks that voodoo dolls
are only for sticking pins into, for people you want to
"hex", but we have learned that voodoo dolls have many
other uses, including beneficial ones in the magical
and healing practices of the Creole people of the
Caribbean region and Louisiana.  

Thinking up painting titles isn't always easy, but Pam
decided that "Mass Moss" works for this. Works for me!

A zillion little pen dots later and Pam called this one
"Living and Breathing". It's one of my favourites from the
whole exhibition. I can't quite grasp the levels of patience and
precision needed to do this, and all within the hectic schedule
of pumping out a painting a day for 31 days in succession. 

So, if you live in Sydney and want to see not only Pam's art but the utterly different and equally creative works of half a dozen other Sydney artists, pop along to Gallery Red, at shop 11, 131-145 Glebe Point Road and enjoy the show. "31 Days" is on until October 1. It's open Monday-Friday 10-5, Saturdays 10-3, but it's closed on Sundays. Here's their Facebook page. https://www.facebook.com/GalleryRedGlebe 

Finally, I thought I should also show you this, which is another
little hobby of mine, when I'm not gardening. I collect little
model cars (from the 1930s to the end of the 1960s mostly)
and I like to create dioramas of these cars in real life situations,
using Photoshop to form the images. So, inspired by Pam's
love of Spanish moss, I took one of the photos from our Natchez
plantation, added a 1957 Studebaker Silver Hawk and a couple
of picnickers, and created my "Picnic in Natchez" diorama.

One of these days Pammy and I will be going back to the USA and hopefully we'll visit Natchez again, too. Not sure if we'll be driving a '57 Studebaker, but we will take a picnic basket, spread out a rug and have another lovely day together under the ethereal tresses of Spanish moss.

Growing a beard

A happy coincidence has prompted this little posting. Last weekend Pammy and I moved our Spanish Moss (aka Old Man's Beard, or more correctly Tillandsia usneoides), from the spot where it has not thrived into one where we hope it will do much better.

Then this morning I was visiting Ngeun's blog and there was his gorgeous watercolour painting of Tillandsia usneoides (along with lots of other really interesting watercolours). Time for a Tillandsia posting here at GA!

Pam and I have always loved Spanish moss, and our plant once was a thriving, healthy thing that actually flowered for us, but over the last few years it has gone downhill slowly but surely, and we thought it must be its position that's to blame. Time for a move to a better, kinder spot, because we both love this unusual yet wonderful air plant. 

Now, last year while in the USA we saw ridiculous amounts of Spanish moss thriving on the Southern Live Oak trees which they favour over there. Pictured below are just two examples from an old plantation in Mississippi which sum up the magic of this 'air plant' which has no roots and gets all its nutrients and moisture from the rain and runoff from the trees on which it resides.

This is the look we're after; just like the old
plantation down in Natchez, Mississippi
(which you can read about here). 

All we lack here is 50 acres of ground and a
hundred or so centuries-old Southern Live Oaks.

So our olive tree will have to do, and the
remnants of our unhappy Spanish Moss
will have to start up a colony there.

The former position of our Spanish Moss was
a pair of wall pots down the side of our house.
At first it thrived there for a few years, then
in the last two years it just began to die off
and wither. I thought its spot was semi-shady
enough, but perhaps it did get a bit too much
full sun in the midday blast of heat? There was
enough left in fairly good condition to start up the
current olive tree drapings, so I am hoping Sydney's
coming humid, wet summer will do the rest.

I think where I went wrong is that a tree is the only really satisfactory natural home for this plant. It needs the constant dappled shade of evergreen leaves, and perhaps there's a minuscule but important feeding provided by the runoff passing over the host tree's foliage? That's just me guessing, but where I had it out in a more open yet shady spot, draped from pots, was all wrong, despite regular misting by me and Sydney's generous rainfall.

We'll know that our Spanish Moss is truly happy once more when it starts to flower. Back in November 2008, our Spanish Moss was so deliriously in love with life that it actually flowered. I blogged about that here, and they are teeny weeny tiny little flowers, but since then in subsequent Novembers it has failed to bloom. I'm expecting no baby green blooms this year of course, but my hopes will be up high this time next year. Stay tuned. In the meantime, and to finish off, three pix of the Old Man's Beard in full bloom, from the glory days, when it was healthy, young and carefree, in love with life.