Hi, I'm Tim Upson.
We're here at the Hampton
Court Flower Festival,
just about to go into the Floral Marquee.
It’s full of some weird
and wonderful plants.
Let's go and see
some of those botanical marvels.
Please come this way.
When I first came into the marquee.
it was a flash of pink
that caught my eye.
And it's this plant here, the angel's
fishing rod or Dierama pulcherrimum.
And, well,
maybe this demonstrates beautifully
where it gets its name.
The angel's fishing rod,
these long,
wispy stems and the flower spikes
hanging downwards
just as a fishing rod would.
So a wonderful display here.
Lots of greens from the Restios,
punctuated by pinks of the angel's
fishing rod.
So really feel at home
in South Africa here.
Very excited to be by the Dibleys
stand here.
Very well known for their Streptocarpus,
a wonderful houseplant
and a relative of the African violets.
But what really excited me
are some of those other
relatives of African violets
in the family
Gesneriaceae that they have here
on this stand.
Primulina, here
you can see them here,
these wonderful drooping
flower heads, these massive
leaves really
almost looks like
African violets on steroids, pale
yellow, some here but this wonderful
purple colour here as well.
I can't remember
the last time I saw these.
So fantastic to see this array
of African violet relatives
here on the Dibley stand.
There is one special plant
on the Hampshire Carnivorous,
the pitcher plants.
A Sarracenia minor are here.
The hooded pitchers you can see
from the structure of the pitcher.
They're absolutely fantastic.
Beautiful specimen.
They come from the bogs
of southern North America,
and their carnivorous so they
capture
insects in the tubes and
digest them.
Of course,
you know,
if you're talking about
botanical marvels,
you have to include the orchids.
And they've evolved
for very particular pollination.
And these are pollinated by Euglossine
bees.
So a very large bee,
which is sort of large
enough and powerful enough
to force itself into the flower.
With this species Anguloa Uniflora
has the common name of baby swaddling.
And the idea is
you can see the sexual parts
of the flower
on the inside
they’re representing the baby
and then the petals
or the petalite
structures of the orchid
it's all surrounding it
as if it's bathing the baby inside.
But it's all about pollination
and it's about how the bee enters
the flower and collects the pollen.
We’re here at Surreal Succulents
looking at some of their fantastic plants
that they've got here.
Now, there's one group
which has particularly taken my eye.
I really got to know them
when I was exploring the Canary Islands.
And of course
this is where
most of the plant diversity comes from
and one here,
which is in rather spectacular flower
is aeonium tabuliforme
or if you like, the plate aeonium.
And
and as you can see, it
forms these very flat rosettes
so it grows on the lava cliffs
in the Canary Islands.
And then just every so often,
once it's reached a suitable size,
it produces these spectacular flowers.
And actually that rosette will die.
It will put all its energy into flowering
and producing seed
for the next generation.
So aeoniums whenever they flower,
they always are a spectacular sight.
So beautiful to see these plants here.
I’m really excited
to see the Manihot here
but not the usual one that I know from
the tropics,
which is cassava cultivated for
its roots.
But this is a much hardier one, Manihot
grahamii, and it's got such beautiful
leaves here
that really bring a tropical feel
and effect
to any garden
and you know
just been chatting
and it does seem to be hardy
maybe needs a
slightly warmer position,
a bit of mulching
in the winter but it’s
well worth
finding a south facing wall
to grow this plant.