Plant peeping; two drive-bys and a nursery visit

I love it when I get a message alerting me to a nearby planting that I should check out, this one came in as I was finally preparing to leave the house post-storm. My car had been parked in the drive for too long!

This fantastic Agave ovatifolia was the plant that spurred the message, but the rest of the hellstrip (arctostaphylos and olive) was pretty sweet too.

And since the cold and ice wasn't completely done with Portland, you get to see ice and olives in the cracks...

While the agave looked untouched by the weather, sadly that was not the case for this toasted Echium wildpretii.

A nearby Drimys winteri...

...sustained a little wind damage, the silver undersides of the leaves get me. So pretty.

Unfortunately the plant itself seems to always have an awkward form.

Another day, another agave drive-by. This one I discovered on my own, on a street I drive regularly. How have I missed this? It's ginormous!

 Sadly there's a bit of an issue at the center.

I had to smile at their spine protection, it is very close to the sidewalk.

Hopefully the ugly spots at the center won't be fatal, but worst case scenario there's a nice sized pup waiting to take over.

 

I was so enthralled with the agave that I didn't notice the two plants behind it, up against the house, until editing my photos. On the left, maybe a leptospermum? Whatever it is appears to be rather unhappy with the cold. On the right is a Genista aetnensis doing the flopping thing that they seem to love to do (and why I no longer have one of them).

Their Metapanax delavayi looks like mine. Sad, burnt foliage.

Looking back towards the agave...

Nice form on the arctostaphylos, which looks oblivious to the cold. Not so for the eucalyptus though.

Will it pull thru? I have no idea.

Around the side of the house is this happy schefflera (S. delavayi I believe, or as it's now known Heptapleurum delavayi). So many seeds!

And a good sized patch of Tetrapanax papyrifer. It will be interesting to see of our tetrapanax around town are knocked back from the cold, or if they sprout from the top again this spring.

Another day, another adventure. I was definitely feeling the mental weight of the cold wet weather and garden damage, and so I hatched an escape plan. Not Hawaii, or Southern California, no the best I could do for an afternoon was a drive south to the greenhouses of Raintree Tropical in Silverton, Oregon. I first visited last spring and remember filing it away as a great winter-time destination. 

This interesting custom palm greenhouse was the first thing I noticed when I got out of my car. I wish I could tell you what's under there, I was told, but I don't remember.

My eyes say trachycarpus, but they're probably something more special than just straight Trachycarpus fortunei.

This big bad boy (Butia capitata? I really don't know my palms!) had a cover at his base, but a light-colored spear at the center and a couple of fronds on the ground. I hope it's okay.

Into the greenhouses! Cycads...

Spiky dyckia...

Summer! That's how it felt seeing at these Ensete ventricosum 'Maurelii'.

This was a mystery to me. It was popping up in the pots of other plants.

Obviously a fern, and obviously a little "weedy"...

Ditto for this one. 

A friend good with ID thinks maybe Adiantum hispidulum? Seems like a good possibility to me.

It smelled green and alive in there... exactly what I needed.

I'm pretty sure I took a photo of this same staghorn fern the last time I visited. It's happy.

Callisia fragrans spreading its "wings". The plant starts from that green pot with the arrow, but heads out in all directions. Pretty fabulous.

Froggy! There were several, but I only got one photo.

Didn't get the name of the orchid, but there were a lot of blooms.

Yes, I came home with plants. The only one that was labeled was the Pyrrosia lingua bottom left. Clockwise from there is one of the weedy mystery ferns, a volunteer phlebodium and an unlabeled vriesea of some sort.

I put out a call on Facebook asking if anyone could name that fern, and James Andrew Gould came up with what I think is the winner, Pteris vittata. Is it hardy? Maybe. The helpful person working at Raintree said no, but there's a form on the Plant Delights website (Pteris vittata 'Benzilan') that they're claiming is hardy to Zone 7. There was a handsome clump growing epiphytically on the side of a fountain in one of the Raintree greenhouses. I'm a little obsessed...

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