Flesh is sticky and contains 3-5 tanish colored seeds.

Phormium tenax is usually naturally found in lowland and swampy areas perching on hummocks. Has very stiff and upright leaves to about 10', though some of the purple cultivars are definitely lax. Dark red flowers and seed pods. Will easily take moderate frosts down to about -8C. Usually grows out in the open, in full Kiwi sun. (High UV.) Summer temps usually around 20-30C. Phormium cookianum/colensoi is often found on hillsides up to about 1200m and in well-drained gullies. It has more floppy leaves, yellow flowers and brown twisted seed pods. Easily takes frosts and some snowfall, though not lasting. More of a bush-edge plant but also ok with being open, though it may not grow as tall. Both tolerate droughty spells. And frequent winter rains. Both have a very tough covering on the leaves, though they will fray if they suffer a lot of wind. Hardy by the sea. Possible over-wintering - cheat and remove a young fan from the rhizome. Trim it as you would a bearded iris - with the young growing tip being in the middle and the longest. Plant up in a gritty but moisture-holding brew so the roots will develop well. (If your summers are brutal - pot them on to something more moisture retentive.) That's insurance against disaster. If there aren't many pots then the inground proposal seems good - plus traditional hay bales around the edges and a thick cover of ag plastic, bubble wrap, fleece, old blankets - whatever is suitable for your area. When you bring them back for spring-summer harden off carefully so that leaf 'wax' can rebuild because that is what provides a lot of the hardiness. Mealy bugs. I would suspect deep droughting in the container or the lack of water-holding in the mix. Good drainage, yes, but not the sort of miserable mix that pretends to be wet on top while holding the lower reaches from rewetting. A possible solution (for some) may be the addition of pumice pieces of about 5mm to the mix. And repotting every one to two years, or adding a good organic mulch. They have extensive root systems and will quite quickly fill a container.

Sounds like you're getting sprouts from the rootstock. If you can take some photos of the sprouts and post them in your message, that would be helpful. If the sprouts are coming from the roots, this might mean the top of the tree - the scion - which is the variety that has been grafted to the rootstock may be suffering, so take some photos of the whole tree as well. And, if you can snap some pics of the orange, and include the underside if there's a navel, that is also helpful. Navels are in season now, so if you have ripe oranges with a navel, you have one of the navel varieties, most likely Parent Washington navel. You can upload your photos to Photobucket, then copy the HTML code of each photo (NOT the url, but the HTML code string), then paste that directly into your message body, and when you click "Preview", you should then see your photos embedded directly into your message. Much easier for us to answer you on the forum that way :-) Patty S.

as everyone on the east coast knows. this past has been horrible cool and wet. rain and no sun. I brought my peppers indoors several days ago. they had been out in the day and into the garage at night. well they are now indoors and warm and they are growing nice under the shop lights. I am keeping the room warm. and the light on all day and night. I need growth before putting them outdoors. I will probably put them out around june 1. hard for me to wait any longer. but I hope they will be a good size at that time. If I can get the habs to 4 to 5 inches by that time I will be happy. they do pretty well even when small. I have almost 100 habs so I will be fine. I think habs make great paprika and great sauce. and I hope to make plenty this fall. I eat a couple of gallons of sauce a year now. easy to do for me. but I want more variety. I have some red savina going and some hot jalapenos. but I need to get some good ones for next year. chiltepins and all kinds of others I read about on this web site.