Freesia

In todays society we have many choices for the flowers for our wedding and depending

on your budget you can have your bouquets as elaborate or as simple as you want.

Have you thought of using the humble freesia in your bouquets. They are a beautiful flower and will enchance

any arrangement you choose or can be used in conjunction with other flowers.

The white and creams

 shades are particularly nice but as they come in many

different colours as well , you have plenty of choice

They are predominately a spring and summer flower but with greenhouses and controlled enviroments

they can be grown most of the year but each country has its own criteria.

Freesias are a native flower of South Africa

There are 19 species which are found nowhere else in the world. The oldest  known species which was cultivated overseas was F. refacta. With the introduction of a pink flowered species F. armstrongii which flowered at Kew in 1898, hybrids between these 2 species were developed to give the modern strains.

The species F. armstrongii resembles F. refracta in shape and size , but the flowers are pink. it was discovered at Humansdorp in the eastern Cape and is one of the parents of the modern hybrids.

The yellow spotted freesia F. flava was formely a variety of F. sparmannii . This variety has fragrant creamy flowers with a deep yellow blotch on the middle petal of the lower lip. The base colour of the flowers varies from pure white to yellow, but they all have the deep blotch. This species comes from the eastern Cape near Albany.

The species F. sparmannii are a fragrant flower and have  pure white or creamy, wide -open flowers, sometimes tinged with blue on the outside of the petals. They come from the eastern Cape.

 The best known species is F. refracta usually known as the common freesia. They have a stem length which varies in height from  15cm to 50cm and has a branching stem. The flowers each measure about 4cm in length. they are a greenish yellow and suffused with dull purple on the outside of the upper petals. The lower petals are marked with brownish yellow and each has a purple line down the centre. A number of horticultural varieties have been named , but these are believed to be separate species

Daily maintenance is an ongoing job but extremely necessary for the health of your plants.

I try to weed out 25 trays each day but  it is slow work being very important to not disturb

the root system of the growing bulbs.

I have increased the frequency of watering  putting the meter down to 2000 . Once the cold weather really sets in I may have to lower this further as the light hours decrease.

Nutrient is having to be added manually  as one of the solenoids has become very unreliable and occasionally will dump more nutrient into the water than what it is set for. To much nutrient has as many problems as not enough so to be on the safe side I will add manually for the meantime.

The leaf growth dosent appear to be as prolific as last season , but as the plants are looking healthy and are still free of thrips there isnt any cause for concern.