Monday, December 8, 2008

Pretty picture: Tillandsia NOID flower

Picture may be slightly improved by opening it in a different window.

I find air plants interesting, but I don't have any myself, nor do I think I'm likely to in the future. There's something off-putting, for me, about any plant that doesn't need soil. (I still think orchids, though beautiful, are a little untrustworthy.)

WCW thinks air plants are awesome, though: when we got this last shipment of stuff in, including a large box containing 100 air plants, I was informed that although I could put any of the other plants out on the sales floor, in any arrangement desired, if I so much as thought about displaying the air plants before she'd had time to go through the box and buy the ones she liked, there would be unspecified, extreeeeeeemely dire consequences.

So I left them alone. (What am I, stupid?)

They don't always flower, though a good proportion of them usually do. I don't know how long the blooms last, because generally once there's a flower, they sell and then I never see them again. I know they at least last more than a day. For some reason, this often surprises the customers: I don't know how many people, when I point out the flowers, have exclaimed, Oh! I didn't know they flowered!

I never know how to respond to that.


2 comments:

Unknown said...

Air plants are different for sure, my neighbor gave me one, I wrapped moss around it and stuck it in a hole in the side of an Oak Tree. It's doing fine.

IBOY said...

I'll bet 99% of those that are sold around here are dead in a year (or so ratty they get tossed). Kind of like Venus fly traps.
don