I'm not sure my postal code would make it through to get a reply! I imagine if you did get a zone to come up, that it would be wrong. The zone FAQ IS US orientated but then so is the forum so that's fair enough I was wondering about our bulb loving members across the big pond and wondering how it should be handled. Flora, you chose then to list your zone as a USDA (United States Department of Agriculture) zone? I've always been curious about your zone8/9. vetivert, Have you also chosen to list your zone as a USDA zone? I've wondered about yours too, and deduced you are in a 'quite' warm zone, compared to mine. If either of you have a link to a zone map for your areas, I 'think' I can include it in the FAQ too...will have to have it verified before input. I was told that linking to informational sites was allowed. I 'think' it would be all right to link to USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map What do you think about linking to similar sites for finding one's zone in NI, NZ, or UK? Needed? Would it be used? Do you know of similar sites? Want them included if it is all right? And a reference that takes account of altitude could be useful to those hardy gardeners in Colorado, Utah, and California perching high in the hills! Is that what one would refer to as micro-climates? Maybe touch on them a bit too, explaining that the zones are 'approximate' and could vary some depending upon one's location within the zone. One little nit-pick. 6. 'Gladiola'..... Gladiolus (singular) Gladioli (plural) Not nit-picking at all. I would like things to be as correct as possible, which includes terms, spelling, grammar and punctuation. So who wants to pull together the reply as it could be posted? I have read and read about the USDA zones and find myself then using 'their words' and sure don't want to get into any plagiarizing problems on down the line. btw...all members who contribute to the input will be mentioned and given credit, so I guess we can used each others input without it being an actual quote, right? Am I stressing and over thinking all this? This is just the first FAQ...sigh. (PS you might like to make #2 the one that covers 'I left my bulbs in a baggie and forgot to plant them. Now what?' ;-))) ) being a 'seasonal' question, I inserted it after #5. It will appear before folks start posting Help! My daffodils are emerging too early!

Mine mature well in Portland. I did have a variety that ripened in December here instead of November. Then we got to 15 in late November. No fruit off that plant that year. I agree with Larry Gene: Seattle-not enough sun, OR-WA coast not enough sun. Even in Portland, it better be in full sun. In ground better than in pot. I hand pollinate to get a lot of fruit. Since I transplanted a mature plant, not much fruit. I'm going to try to grow another seedling off of my fruit. FLowers are beautiful and very yummy. Native bird in Brazil eats the flowers, which don't affect pollination. Then it's tail feathers pollinate the fruit. John S PDX OR

I have to post a couple more pictures from the incredible Blue Mountains Botanic Garden at Mount Tomah. It was my favorite garden on this trip. Although not having the variety of Rhododendrons that can be found in Olinda, the scenic aspect of it is just mind boggling. I can think of only 2 other gardens I've visited with such an amazing natural setting and attendant sense of place - UC Berkeley, and Villa Taranto on a mountainside next to Lago Maggiore. (In fairness, I should really wrap in Isola Madre and Isola Brissago and just say "the absolutely incredible Gardens of Lago Maggiore". The latter two merely sit in the lake, while Villa Taranto allows you to climb at least a couple hundred feet up and feel like you're in the clouds looking down, as does the UC Berkeley garden. As close to the Horticulturally Edenic as you will find, I think.) Looking at these pics years later, I now spot, for example, that there was a Glyptostrobus (probably!) that I hadn't even noticed. Here were some of their native grass trees, albeit smaller than ones I saw in coastal Victoria: A few more from Australia. Here is the lush undergrowth of the Blue Mountains. The is the biome that the Wollemi pine comes from. Phil explained to me what this plant was. It looks like a South African Erica, but is actually the Aussie version. It's either also in the Ericaeae, or is another plant family that co-evolved to look similar. Sorry, can't remember! Finally a view of the forest-y part of the Sydney Botanical Garden. Looking and feeling every bit like being on a tropical island, but quite a ways from the tropics. Sydney is as far south as Myrtle Beach is north. 33S. Good luck creating anything like this in Myrtle Beach! Practically any plant recognized by northern tourists as a 'tropical' plant grows here, barring coconuts. You have go closer to the Queensland border to find those, they simply can't deal with the frost-free albeit slightly chilly winters of Sydney. On to Christchurch! A quintessential NZ scene at the Christchurch Botanic Garden. NZ Flax, of course! Tree ferns, of course! Weird little conifer - probably one of the shrubby Podocarps, of course! Nearby was the bizarre looking Phyllocladus alpinus, aka 'Celery Pine'. You can grow this in the milder parts of the PNW, definitely not in the eastern US. Typical plantings...a young Telopia, a Callistemon, and Kniphofia northiae. Although clearly not as mild as most of the gardens I saw in AU, it's still pretty damn mild, as is evidenced by the fact they can use Clivias as bedding plants! I suspect Christchurch is probably 10a in the milder parts, 9b if you get away from the coast or 'urban heat island'. IIRC the guy who used to post on GOTE from there put 9b in his profile. I saw, for example, winter blooming South African aloes, but far more infrequently than in AU, and maybe only in sheltered north facing gardens har har har.

Great observation. I have not visited US West Coast ever, but yes, Azores has rather high temp for lows and low for highs. I did not know SFO has ~45F as all time lows though. Azores about 8 months of the year are taking long time to warm up even into June and are staying mostly below 70F and then when they warm in June-July up they stay mostly above 66F for 3-4 months. If SFO has never below 45F it is a perfect climate for most. According to this website SFO is not an exact match to the Azores islands: https://www.tripsavvy.com/san-francisco-climate-and-weather-1479149 "San Francisco Weather Records The highest recorded temperature in San Francisco was 39°C on July 17, 1988, and June 14, 2000. The lowest was −3°C on December 11, 1932." Azores never above 30C (86F) and never below 6C (45F). Some very rare historical tempos may show above 30C or below 6C in the Azores, but those are rather very rare exceptions. Usually 10C to 25C or 50F to 77F and very stable at that. Although it can be "close", but in the Azores summer temperatures are very constantly (and stable) at 68F to 77F with very strong sunshine and very high humidity above 75% most of the time, which makes sure your skin never cracks. The temp never goes below 65F in summer months between late June and first part of September. Probably a better match for NZ climate although I have not studied it and much more tropical than NZ or SFO, even that Azores are at 36 to 39 degrees latitude above the Equator, but the Gulf Stream makes Azores climate milder by at least 10 to 15 degrees above and beyond the Equator, which means while tropics usually begin with about 25 or 24 degrees above the Equator the Gulf Stream warms it up and the tropics in the Northern Atlantic are located up to 40 degrees latitude. Those may be not typical tropics, but rather pseudo-tropics or extra-tropics where the lows are lower and the highs are also lower, but influence from the Gulf Stream makes it more or less tropical. I would call them Mild or Cool Oceanic Tropics and some sources refer them rather incorrectly as to Temperate Climate, but temperate climate usually has freezing temperatures as lows, so this is not even SFO climate and rather an exceptional, a very rare fully oceanic pseudo-tropical climate, probably unique in the world along with Madeira. Some say Lord Howe Island has a similar climate, yet Lord Howe Island is within typical subtropical latitudes (31 degrees above Equator) and the Azores are way North at 36 to 39 degrees above Equator. Also, I know someone near me who is growing a coconut palm tree and to my opinion it looks a bit miserable and I doubt it will ever produce fruit. It needs heat, much more than Azores can produce, I must agree that Azores is not a true tropical climate and not a true subtropical climate either or not a true temperate climate either and needs a name of its own. Perhaps one should name it a Gulf Stream influenced extra-tropics. I do grow most tropical palms here, but some super-tropicals, that require constant at least 18C to 35C do not do well here and some have died as seedlings, but I am not sure how they would do as adult plants. If anyone wants to send me adult palms from super-tropics I could test grow them here. So having said all that it means that Azores is lacking HEAT and its all time lows or constant lows are too low to treat it as true tropics, such as Singapore, Philippines etc. but Eucalyptus deglupta does fine here even as mini-seedlings being held outdoors even in full wind and so do bananas, even with insufficient heat. I do test a lot of tropical plants here and some or rather most survive fine and some do not do well or even die, probabaly from excessive rain in winter, and or wind. Most tropical palm seedlings do fine, or do well and survived 3 "winters" so far.