Marblehead

Marble Gardens & Fish Ponds

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While I was away I lost one of my bigger fish to a black snake . I seen him snooping around there. Also I lost 3 and one of them getting large , spotted bristle nose catfish, all dead on the bottom (fish guy said they can eat this algae in the water that only affects them )    I replaced them with two new natives in the inside tank ;  crimson spotted rainbow fish .   I'll go native from nw on , as I had not realised how many amazing little native colorful fish there are .... and cold water, so no need to go tropical . 

 

 

d9849f61fd88c678bef71483d4bc36f6.jpg

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My Hibiscus is blooming like crazy and full of buds! Such a big, happy flower.

18554042_10212994276955370_107066419_o.thumb.jpg.795ff5cc423316e1f75a3de6407ae11b.jpg

 

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 2 new rainbow fish as got my bigger tank back  *     Turquoise Rainbow fish from  New Guinea 

 

Related image

 

 

*  The large tank was housing the axolotl  , a friend 'looked after him '  while I was in hospital  ......    he  karked it   somehow , for some reason .    :(

 

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What about dreamfish ?  Also known as Nightmare Fish  .....       a psychotropic fish that when eaten can give one nightmares .

 

Hamilton  ( from the  TV doco 'Hamilton's Pharmacopeia' )  ate some in last week's episode .  Later he told a fellow researcher ;  "I woke up screaming 3 times during the night  .... but it wasnt too bad . "       :blink:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hallucinogenic_fish

Edited by Nungali
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Yep, there are many aquatic animals that are very harmful and even deadly to humans if eaten or even touched.

 

Beware the pretty box jellyfish.

 

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Well, no complaining about not getting any rain for a while.  I have gotten some really good rain the past three days.  All fifty of my 55 gallon drums are full and most of the pond areas are full as well.

 

 

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Anyone know what this is? It is vine-like with more papery than waxy petals.

.18762306_1364484910310684_1609408382_n.jpg.ebdab17db2033a18db986080a182e30c.jpg

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1 hour ago, Kar3n said:

Anyone know what this is? It is vine-like with more papery than waxy petals.

.18762306_1364484910310684_1609408382_n.jpg.ebdab17db2033a18db986080a182e30c.jpg

Possibly?  a cultivar of  Pachystachys lutea which is usually yellow but also comes in red .. shrimp plant 

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2 minutes ago, Stosh said:

Possibly?  a cultivar of  Pachystachys lutea which is usually yellow but also comes in red .. shrimp plant 

That's what it looks like to me.

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1 hour ago, Kar3n said:

Anyone know what this is? It is vine-like with more papery than waxy petals.

.18762306_1364484910310684_1609408382_n.jpg.ebdab17db2033a18db986080a182e30c.jpg

 

Familiar , I remember examining and feeling flowers just like that , no name , sorry.

 

Anyway, yesterday's adventures out by the fish ponds beside the front path in to the cabin .....  that the hell is that on the ground (in the early predawn light  ) ..... a kookaburra !   he didnt fly away but fluttered and rolled along the ground ..... oh O ! 

 

Appears to have a broken wing and bad leg. Right in front of the ponds.   I have them set up so there isnt a direct dive line into, but I guess he tried to make it and hit something ?    So I put him in a box with a blanket and warm water bottle, he spent the rest of the day in cabin, got the fire going to keep him warm, cold last night out there, I doubt he would have made it.

 

This morning he was out the box and at the window .....  thats a good sign ... but,    "Dude !  you cant fly ! " 

 

yesterday was Sunday, so most things closed. Another two hours vet in town should be open so I take him in there.  They will treat native animals for free . 

 

Hang in there kooka ... won't be long now .

 

Oh yeah ... the fish seem intact ,  they have a huge wooden plank overhang ledge to get under and some  hollow concrete block  'caves' down on the bottom. 

 

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16 minutes ago, Stosh said:

Possibly?  a cultivar of  Pachystachys lutea which is usually yellow but also comes in red .. shrimp plant 

 

13 minutes ago, Brian said:

That's what it looks like to me.

My son in law bought it a flea market and did not know what it is. I might know a lot about gardening and plant varieties, but I am by no means an expert. Thank you, thank you! :)

http://floridata.com/Plants/Acanthaceae/Justicia brandegeana/13

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And speaking of flowers (in the other thread) I went out front this morning and immediately noticed a Passion Vine flower had opened.  First one after cutting the vine back earlier in the year.  Beautiful scarlet red.

 

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1 minute ago, Marblehead said:

And speaking of flowers (in the other thread) I went out front this morning and immediately noticed a Passion Vine flower had opened.  First one after cutting the vine back earlier in the year.  Beautiful scarlet red.

 

Picture?

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Oh, that is gorgeous! I have a pot with a trellis I'd like to put a vine in. I am thinking I have found it .

 

Thanks for sharing. :)

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Regarding fishes

 

My experiment seems over. Tomorrow is the first day of spring and all fishies are alive and well .

 

- The aquarium guy said I would need a heated a tank to keep them  ......   nope ! 

 

Fish tank heater Schego 560

Fish tank heater Schego 560

$94.00
 
( and probably needed  more battery power and another solar panel to run it )
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Gardens .

 

The  spring rains have finally started and everything has picked up .    A special plant I have been cultivating ( because it loves it here , I bought one 4 years ago now I probably got about a dozen ) .  It dies back when its cold so I dry them out and repot the rhizome each year and any extra nodules that have grown off that .  

 

Today I tipped out the dry pot from the mother plant ,  it had another 9  sprouting rhizomes   coming out, so I potted them up to. 

 

I am ' Elephant Ear rich '  !  This year, the other plant should be huge, going by the size of its rhizome !

 

Xanthosoma Albo Marginata  -  ' Mickey Mouse '  Elephant Ear .  ....   ?      'deformed mouse ear '  that would be . ... but they do draw interest and attention.  

 

  Image result for Xanthosoma Albo Marginata Mickey Mouse Elephant Ear

 

Image result for Xanthosoma Albo Marginata Mickey Mouse Elephant Ear

 

 

    Image result for Xanthosoma Albo Marginata Mickey Mouse Elephant Ear

 

 

 I also have had success  with  dwarf  red variegated ginger plant      that looks great growing around  this one's  base .

 

Image result for Xanthosoma Albo Marginata Mickey Mouse Elephant Ear

 

... and  .... the rain has just started again ... with all my potted up new babies getting it  :) 

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On ‎8‎/‎30‎/‎2017 at 7:36 PM, Kar3n said:

Oh, that is gorgeous! I have a pot with a trellis I'd like to put a vine in. I am thinking I have found it .

 

Thanks for sharing. :)

Before planting any, consider that in some climates it is considered an invasive plant.  It propagates via seed as well as new growth from the roots.  It may naturally spread on its own if not regularly maintained.

 

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On ‎8‎/‎30‎/‎2017 at 9:26 PM, Nungali said:

Regarding fishes

 

My experiment seems over. Tomorrow is the first day of spring and all fishies are alive and well .

 

- The aquarium guy said I would need a heated a tank to keep them  ......   nope ! 

 

 

Yeah, some fish are able to acclimate to varying water temperatures if the changes are slow and gradual.

 

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More unusual stuff happening in my garden ;

 

My green pitcher plants died during winter so I cut them back to the moss level ( they in a 'peat bog' pot )  .  This spring they shot back up, looking very healthy  but this weird stalk came up in them. Is it a flower stalk or an invader,   It was hanging down with a ball on the end. then started to open this morning .... an intricate spiralling unfolding, but there is a type of ball underneath.

 

I checked it on sunset and it looked shredded, Thinking insect attack, I googled some pics .... yep a flower ... but a strange one !

 

Here is the bud coming up with a higher one starting to open.

 

Image result for green pitcher plant flower

 

 

Here is the 'shredded ' stage

 

Image result for green pitcher plant flower

 

 

Didn't make much sense until I found this pic of a cross-section  ;

 

 

Image result for pitcher plant flower

 

 

'Open the pod bay doors Hal' .    :) 

 

Hope I get fruit and seed .

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Well, I went outside to do a little work in the gardens.  I normally stop working when the temperature reaches 80 degrees.  When I went outside the temperature was 80 degrees.

 

I did water a few plants though because the temperature yesterday got up to 106 degrees.  That sucks all the moisture out of the plants.

 

Weeds are still growing well though.

 

 

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4 hours ago, Marblehead said:

Weeds are still growing well though.

 

People love grass and hate weeds. Maintaining the garden is a constant struggle.

 

I have learned to love weeds and hate grass. Maintaining my garden is effortless.

 

Too bad my neighbors hate me... :P

 

Edited by Lost in Translation
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That 'God-damned weed' that kept growing by my front door path turned out to be a remedy that stopped me going to hospital with kidney stone pain one night .

 

All I could do was crawl , I made it out the front door and up the path, then I remembered about the qualities of that 'weed'. I chewed some up .... 

 

I was pain free, back in bed  and asleep in 1/2 an hour .

 

I  love  that weed  !   :wub:

Edited by Nungali
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