You are reading "The Red Tag Journal". Stuff found in this section is NOT FOR SALE. I wanted a place on my website to post pictures and write about my greenhouse or garden, or whatever... If you find it here and you want it then check my Orchid Catalog (use the search box) because THAT is where things for sale will be found. If it here but not in my catalog, I will not respond if you write to ask me how much it costs or when it will be available or if I will sell you a piece or where you can find it.

 Congratulations to Jim and Peggy.  This morning they found this dude sunning on a bench in the south side of the greenhouse and became the first winners of the ‘spot the tree frog’ contest.  This is the first picture of this one, although he is one of the oldest frogs living in the greenhouse.  I know he has been here for two years.  I think they must be somewhat territorial because, when this one is spotted, he is always in the same place, just like the other two I have photographed.  I shall refrain from the obvious and avoid calling him Jaba.  There is one left whose portrait (and soul) I have yet to capture with my camera. 

Spot the Frog and get %10 off your purchase. Now with four ways to win!

Sunset on Christmas Eve. This evening about 4:30 looking northeast across the field from our mailbox. The mountain, low on the horizon behind the trees, is called Sugarloaf. The sky was beautiful this evening. It was a nice glowing orange. And the field of snow below was a serene ice blue. The camera captured a picture with a very heavy blue cast that hid a bit of the sky color. Still a pretty picture. Happy holiday everybody!

A small slide show of pictures taken during and after the large snow storm on December 19th 2009

Quote of the day, “Quit taking pictures of it and eat one.”

I just thought this was pretty. My camera was zoomed in as far as it could get and I had to sneak up on these guys very slowly. I was about 15 feet away inside the warm and toasty sun room trying to take this picture though foggy double pane glass, so it required some cleaning up.

This flower greeted me this morning outside the computer room window in the back yard. I just thought it was pretty. All the color. The plant came up at the base of the bird feeder from seed they threw down.

This was grown from a package of mixed stapelia seed, so I don’t know if it is a hybrid or a species. My uneducated guess is that it is either the species S. gigantea or a hybrid with it as a parent. Very fragrant. Smells like two day old road kill.

I don’t know yet. I had been working under the assumption that this was water damage and had taken great pains to make sure I did not get any water on the leaves while watering my plants. Yet the damage continued to appear on new leaves and seemed to be spreading to other plants.

A friend was visiting on Saturday and asked me if I would recognize Cyclamen Mite damage and I said I would if I saw it on African violets and then proceeded to describe the obvious crinkled and brittle distorted growth pattern of mite infested african violet leaves and he brought me over to the Kohleria bench and pointed at these leaves and told me this was cyclamen mite damage.

Well, so do I… Written descriptions of crosses and pictures in orchid catalogs and on the internet can be a nightmare to the uninitiated.