As the previous posters stated, it is both the weather & genetics of the rose that dictates flower life span. If you are looking for roses with long garden & vase life, I've found that "florist" HT's usually fit the bill the best. Some that I have are Tineke & several Kordes Freelander roses, Antique Caramel Freelander being one of my favs. Also another long lasting bloom is Veteran's Honor. Many of these blooms will last for 10-14 days & sometimes more provided you keep them well watered, especially during hot spells. Many of the Freelander roses can be purchased thru Palatine & Pickering.

GW and Dee, and I just paid $8 for it so I am really happy, and yes the little bulb at the bottom is looking good. I will plant it in the ground as soon as I decide where it will go I have taken it for a couple of walks and put downs to imagine how it will look when it grows up. MM,it is a bit of a pain thinking a picture is posted and then having it dissappear into the wide blue yonder, Oh well I guess they are free programmes. Marion, who is also finding the paragraphs are all running together and not separated,

Hi to all:-) I was given a dried out fruit from a boab tree from Northern Western Australia by a friend who challenged me to get one to grow. Not know a thing about them or even researching I cleaned the seeds up really well by scraping all the chalky/powdery coating around the seeds with my nail. By memory I got around 10seeds and planted 6 straight away in normal potting mix around november in perth . Didn't think anything was going to happen as 6 weeks went past with no success and to my surprise all 6 came up. I had two pots with 3 in each pot and Two didn't survive after separating them and was left with 4. I kept what I thought was the best one and gave the rest away . They all died except mine which was going great with out any special care at all , just a little water every now and then. It's now coming up to one year old and a little under 20 cm high with the trunk base around 1.5 cm round. It lost all it's leaves quite some time ago and the branches have dried out a lot but the trunk still seems healthy and not completely dry like the top branches. Is this normal? At this stage there is no signs of new branches sprouting but the trunk seems to have some life . Has anyone had this problem? It was growing really well until it lost its leaves. Can any one help me on this? If it was to shoot some fresh leaves/ branches when could I expect this to maybe happen? Its in all pot around 20cm round and planning to bonsai it. Any info would be greatly appreciated . I'm quite confident it's not dead but unsure how there meant to look as I've only ever seen pictures of these huge amazing trees.:-)

we have a boab that we brought back with us from the kimberley & it's been doing really well, until just recently we noticed bugs on it. We took a leaf to the nursery & was told it had meelee bug & aphids on it, we were given a spray & were told it's because of the unusual humidity.At the moment the lower leaves are turning yellow & dropping off.Is it the time for the leaves to nfall off?