I have two large areas of my yard in perennials--one is a xyric bed mulched with fine gravel,the other has more water intensive plants and shrubs and is mulched with wood chips. I usually water by hand, but when I am out of town, it is asking a lot of my neighbor to stand out there for over an hour and hand water everything. I'd like to buy one of those sprinklers mounted on an adjustable tripod for the few times a year when a neighbor has to water. Can anyone recommend a sprinker model? Gilmor, Nelson and RainBird make something similar, I believe, but theNelson has received bad ratings. I need one that rises up to about 5 feet since i have some 4 feet tall shrubs in the area. Ideally, I'd like a rotary sprinker that has a square pattern or is adjustable, but it looks like the impulse type is all that is available. I'd appreciate any suggestions. Or, if you have jury-rigged something on your own, I'd love to know what you did. Thanks, Hazel

Hello Karyn, I didn't buy directly from Thailand as it is illegal for me to do so but I imported it from a legal company in Belgium from whom I can buy. Only one of three that have flowered for me has proved to be correct. Last year I had a wrongly named one,then my Chaiang Mai rainbow did come good but now this one cannot possibly be correct. All from the same seller. I bought them as rooted named cuttings some 6yrs ago. I have others from the same source which haven't yet flowered. I know the company deals legally with Thailand. The only consolation is none are the same and are very pretty but I paid over £30 each so I'm beginning to think the so called named (unless you can see them in flower) are just as much of a lottery as seedlings! Hazel.

Crikey Hazel, is there any room left for Jim's fishing equipment?? lol!! The plants certainly look healthy. Lets hope we get some modicum of a summer this year and then all our plants can go outside...and get bigger still... hehe! In our living room at the moment I have 5 orchids, 2 trays of plumie seedlings, 4 bigger plumies, a stephanotis, a 5ft Date palm, 4 2ft Washingtonia palms, the Desert Rose propagator (all 5 are doing fantastic in there (it's just on overnight)and have hardened up and put on new growth), a clivia, oh yes, and the 6 ft Dracaena. The g/h is full and other plants are scattered around the rest of the house, as one does! We have horizontal rain and sleet a the moment. Bring on the warmer weather...please! cheers, Gill.

Hi Hazel & Gill. I haven't seen either of you around lately. I hope all is well. I usually get very good germination from Pride of Barbados and the larger Royal Poincianna. They always look terrible when I move them but recover. Mine drop their foliage when the temps drop (I keep it in the 50's at night in the greenhouse during the winter) but it grows back when it warms up. The problem is that I usually end up forgetting about them and they freeze outside. This year I gave my saplings away before I ended up killing them. I've kept POB and RP's started in the fall/winter in the greenhouse in 4" pots until it was warm enough to move them outside. They get somewhat root bound but take off when I transplant into larger containers. Since it's cool at night in the GH they are dormant and don't put on much growth, if any. My plumies didn't bloom well this year. We had such a long cold spring they broke dormancy almost a month later then average. I'm storing half of them bareroot this winter. I had 30 pots and they were just taking up way too much space. Hopefully they'll survive. If they do I'll store all of them bareroot next year. Have a happy holiday and New Year.