Life of a Blue Ginger

Published on by bushboy

Following on in my flower and plant series “Life of…..” Today is the the Blue Ginger flowers turn.

I have quite a number of Blue Ginger plants in the garden and some are in pots. Not an Australian native plant as I was first told, this beautiful Brazilian perennial is commonly known as Blue Ginger (Dichorisandra thyrsiflora) It is a shade lover loves the morning sun and where I have planted some, they are protected from the afternoon sun

It is a perennial plant which grows from thick, rhizomatous roots. Though known colloquially as blue ginger, it is not related to ginger plants (Zingiberaceae). It belongs instead to the Commelinaceae family of plants.

Enough of the botanical stuff, let’s get on with a few photos from around my place.

I spent time looking for some plants that showed the whole plant and I did find some that I have posted before. This post includes older photos (the larger ones) and the ones taken in Autumn this year. They are smaller as I have to reduce the amount of size in my media folders, something I didn’t think o9f until I saw the WordPress changes for the future. Thanks to Cee for letting me know about resizing my photos.

This is one group of plants at my besties old place where I have some of the these cuttings now growing at my place.

These are some of my plants

I planted this group of Blue Gingers where they don’t get much sun at all so now the flowers are looking for some sunshine. These are well over two metres tall as the roof of my shade house you can see is at least two metres tall.

The stem are also interesting. The green band are where the leaves have dropped off

The beautiful clustered flower heads are vibrant purple-blue and appear atop of spiraled, ginger-like stems of leaves, which often have purplish undersides.

I like the purple colour of the stems that hold the leaves as well. Quite often you can find a bee or other insect in the flowers.

Here are a few Stingless Native Bees feeding on the pollen

The flowers do look inviting

Even when there are some water drops and you can see right inside

No wonder Blue-banded Bees love them

Teddy Bear Bees love them too

Just an arty shot I had to include

When the flowers start to fall, it is almost time for the rest of the plant to die back for Winter. I don’t usually cut the stems back after flowering. I let the stems die back putting their nutrients back into the rhizome for late or after winter when the shoots will appear.

The flowers gradually drop leaving the stem which too will drop.

Also for Cee’s FOTD

26 thoughts on “Life of a Blue Ginger”

  6. Great photos, Brian. Blue gingers are a favorite of mine. Their color just jumps out.
    I’m curious about your file sizes comment. Is WordPress changing their allowance for free sites? Also wondered what files sizes you’re using. I’ve been doing all my photos at 300kb or less (Can’t remember where I got that number though!) and they look fine online at whatever size. Are you gong for even smaller sizes?

    Liked by 2 people

    1. Thanks Graham. One of my favourites as well but hard to get the true colour.
      WP are changing their pricing and choices for new blogs. New free sites are only 1gb. My media folders are almost full as I was just bunging on the photo as is, sometimes up to 2mb. Deleting old photos is tedious and results in old blogs with blank spaces where photos were. Finding those and deleting as well……so much time!!!
      The ones I am posting now are 102kb resized by pixel as to not change the image. I am using 600X480 pixels resizing and 600X600 for square

      Liked by 1 person

  8. I have Ginger Lilies in my garden–also planted in the shade. They produce a white, very fragrant blossom. I don’t know that these are in the same family, but the color of your flowers is beautiful.

    Liked by 2 people

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