Thanks everyone for looking at my photos. Marie: If you want to post photos onto the forum, you must first upload them onto a photo-hosting site, such as Picasa or Photobucket, etc... You can sign up for a free account. Then, after having your photos uploaded onto one of those sites, you can copy the HTML code of the photo there and paste that into your post on GW. You can also post photos following the instructions in the link below. Hope that helps. Xuan Here is a link that might be useful: Instructions on how to post photos to GW posts

Thanks Jen! Yeah, the mealey battle has been a full scale war this winter. I had one plant (a veitchii gardenia) that I found last spring that had mealies and I had isolated it and worked on it all last year and through the winter (it is finally clear). But by golly it spread like wildfire in here - hoyas, stephanotis, passifloras, oleander, coffee arabica. They completely took down my regular carnosa last summer and all I could do was cut a clean piece off, root it in water, and pot it up. The rest of the plant was tossed as the vines progessively died due to the stress. The cutting is doing well so far. The only things they didn't touch in the immediate area were my overwintering habanero pepper plants and my rose-scented geranium. That's interesting to consider. LOL I got the stems all sprayed on the compacta and I put it outside to isolate and will continue the treatments every couple days. Look forward to seeing it bloom again! Now to attack the lacunosa, which has been blooming on and off all winter but that got the mealies first. The lacunosa has such fragile leaves compared to the carnosas that I wanted to be extra careful with it. Plus it has tons and tons of bloom pedicels all over it that I don't want to knock off. Then I have to tackle the incurvula, which doesn't seem to have it that bad. In fact, I might do that one next and leave the lacunosa for last. Here are the bloom remains from the compacta!

It didn't bloom last night. I actually waited until all the house lights were off, took a small flashlight and brought the plant into my bedroom. Every time I woke up slightly I checked if I could smell it blooming. Nothing! Do they bloom shortly after dark or does one have to sit up all night? If so, I am not going to be able to do it. And as for light - how do all the guests at the plant-viewing parties find their wine? Candles maybe would not make enough light to bother the plant? a.m.

i just know, with the exception of last year, since i have has this OXYPETALUM type Epi, i take cuts, root them and that summer on NEW stems/leaves, i get blooms, lots of them. Last year I got not 1. I did add the Mark Twain the year BEFORE, so it is 2 years old, and it didnt bloom either. So something went wrong, the first time in 30 years of having this plant. I HAVE to get it to bloom this coming spring/summer, i miss that flower so much. Maybe my actually feeding it, threw it off. I never or rarely fert. the plants, Last year I FED it with bloom booster fert. 'Miracle Grow'....even though it is a totally new plant, and is every year,just about, I decided to try bloom booster,and got 0 blooms. First time EVER....a major let down. Didnt even help my hoyas, i stopped feeding all my plants, they all look just fine. MAYBE it was just to hot to set blooms. But this comes from the south Americas, and it is a touch hotter there. But in Ft.Laud last year it was over 100 degrees A LOT. For weeks at a time. The weather might say it is 88, but MY themometers outside said it was over 100 daily. and the Oxy. didnt bloom. So..this year coming, i am going to pray for cooler days, and not feed it. But I still want toget more 'Mark Twain', i really dont know if the big plant i have is all Mark Twain,or none. But Logees shipping costs, for even 1 plant, makes whatever THEY send, not worth the price. They are not known for sending BIG plants. It might be in a 4in pot. But it is a fresh new tiny plant or cutting. I have bought from them before, and was VERY upset at the size of the plant. It was a baby. Sorry to go on and on. Still hunting for a 'Mark Twain' Cutting from a private grower, it will be affordable, probably in better shape, and from someone I can probably KNOW it is the real thing.