Africanaussie

A couple of years ago when I still had quite a few bare spots in my back yard I accepted a couple of passalong plants from a neighbour.  I had seen them in his yard, and they were magnificent.  The leaves were lovely and silver-backed and HUGE, and made a lovely sound brushing against each other in the wind.   I was quite taken with them, and planted two out in the corner of my garden next to the heleconias.  That side and corner really started to fill in. Did I mention they were HUGE?  What was I thinking?   I have been slowly cutting some of them back and noticed that they were spreading rather rapidly.  Suddenly I wasn't so in love anymore..... I started working on one clump about a month ago, and it ended badly.... with me sitting in tears sobbing about how I was just not a gardener, nothing grew right in my garden, how stupid could I have been to plant these....everything was just a mess..... I had cut the 12ft leaves down, and dragged...

I got into the garden over the weekend and slashed down the excess branches instead of removing anything.  Most of the leaves that fall from the lychee tree are mulched for the compost but some just lie around on the ground in the tropical plant area under the tree. If there were some greens mixed in they would not be robbing too much nitrogen as they decompose. (just my theory).  That is what works on the forest floor anyway. I thought it might be a good idea to stand at the end of the stone path which is pretty much the middle of the tropical garden and take a panoramic series of photos for you.  This is looking out towards the big gate, with the side fence off to the right.  This is facing approximately south. This could be called palm corner I suppose.  Two fan palms are against the fence, with one sago palm in front of the tree fern.  There is a franzipani and some amaryllis, that have had trouble flowering and I hope they...