Today I saw

[Queen of Spades]

Bird of Paradise

Thanks,both of you. It seems such a shame to have nurtured something for years and have nobody to see it when it finally appears!

It's my second try with a strelitzia, the first one I had seven years. It never flowered, but grew so big that I couldn't get it back into the house after a summer outside (that was several years ago, when we did have a summer) and though I fleeced it up well, it died over winter. This one I'll have had for five years this spring.

[bearded bloke]

Always nice to hear of a success story & see the result as well

[Glutton4...]

Thanks,both of you. It seems such a shame to have nurtured something for years and have nobody to see it when it finally appears!

It's my second try with a strelitzia, the first one I had seven years. It never flowered, but grew so big that I couldn't get it back into the house after a summer outside (that was several years ago, when we did have a summer) and though I fleeced it up well, it died over winter. This one I'll have had for five years this spring.

I was given a huge one by a friend who moved to France. It had flowered the year before, and she told me they don't bloom every year. (I've never checked this fact, by the way.) Like you, I would put my house-plants outside for the summer, and they thrived. Sadly mine died, along with all the others, when we had an unexpected early frost.