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“We are in a very good place in the Netherlands and that is why we are here”

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"We are in a very good place in the Netherlands and that is why we are here"

At tomato grower The Valley , they are testing a harvesting robot. Joost van der Voort talks about it in Elsevier, as the magazine fires eleven questions at the grower. Among other things, Joost explains how different the job of a tomato grower is nowadays, compared to Grandpa’s time. “We say we work…

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A private greenhouse full of exceptional plants (a tour)

News Articles /
A private greenhouse full of exceptional plants (a tour)

I’ve long been enamored with all the cool plants on the Instagram account . Since I knew they were based here in Portland I fired off a casual “can I come visit sometime?” message and (lucky me!), the dream came true. I got to meet the plantsperson behind that account, Steven, tour the greenhouse and touch all the plants! Steven shares this space with Cassandra () whom I did not get to meet. They used to own a local shop called  which has unfortunately closed. The plant passion runs deep here…

Just inside the door and I was lusting after those curvy leaves. Steven says they’re two different forms of Ophioglossum pendulum, yes it’s a fern. The spiky business is Huperzia squarrosa (aka Phlegmariurus squarrosus).

The ruffled foliage looked a little like my crested Pyrrosia lingua but it’s actually Polypodium fallax.

Ceratostema villosa (aka Ceratostema loucianae)

At this point was having a hard time deciding what to focus on. The big picture? Or individual plants? Of course the individual plants won (with occasional pulled back shots). 

I should also note that even though I’d never met Steven before, I instantly felt at ease with him. His plant knowledge was off the charts, but not in an intimidating way. He let me sort of pick my way through the greenhouse and ask questions of the plants I was curious about. I was there for a little over two hours and it felt more like 30 minutes. I can only hope Steven felt the same and wasn’t spending those two hours wondering when the crazy lady was going to finally leave…

Lecanopteris pumila, aka ant fern.
Yes I can definitely say that thanks to Stevens love for ant ferns I too am now a little obsessed. 
Philodendron verrucosum
This leaf was gorgeous from both the front and back and has a fuzzy stem too!
Selliguea platyphylla
One of the most interestingly shaped staghorns I’ve seen, this is a Platycerium veitchii.
Microgramma bifrons 
A close-up.
Platycerium ridleyi
Dendrobium uncatum, it definitely reminds me of my Poncirus trifoliata. Steven mentioned a desire to collect all the zig zag orchids he could find.
This one! Back when Steven shared a  I nearly passed out from sheer plant lust.
And now here I was, standing right in front of it! 
Be still my heart! If Steven hadn’t been such a nice guy I might have been trying to calculate if there was any chance I could grab it and outrun him. Truth be told he probably saw the lust in my eyes because he offered me a cutting (!), yes! More on that at the end of this (long) post.
This was the first time I’d been face to face with this plant “in real life”, but even before seeing on Steven’s Instagram feed I’d seen it on Martha Stewart’s blog. Martha had visited the Amazon Spheres and afterward they’d sent her a box (or two, or three) full of plants. Here’s Martha’s picture of Pyrrosia longifolia…

And back to Steven’s, isn’t it crazy how it’s growing in a piece of bamboo?

Okay, moving on…
Another ant fern I think…
And another Huperzia species. I asked if this one had been resting on a shelf or something to get the flat-bottom effect but that’s just how it’s growing.
Hot! Am I right? Anthurium wendlingeri
 I wanna call this a aglaomorpha, but it might also be a drynaria.
Another of those cool plants I’ve seen photos of, but never in real life; Selenicereus wittii. yes it’s a cactus.
“A very strange and unique species of epiphytic cacti from the seasonally flooded forests of the Amazon basin of Brazil. It clings tightly flat against the trunks for forest trees just at the high water mark of the seasonal flood. The segments of the stem are broad and flat and approximate two inches wide and four to six inches long. There are fine marginal spines in tufts. The flowers are fragrant and are borne on long peduncles and are about four inches in diameter and bright white, emerging only at night and fading by first light” (source)
Shortly after my visit , I was shocked how much was lost in translation, but that meant I wasn’t too upset when I looked at my photos and they didn’t do it justice. In person this was absolutely stunning, Monolena primuliflora…
Truth be told the bits left after the flowers fade might have been my favorite part.
Oh ya! Sexy begonia alert, Begonia paulensis.
Looks like a nice chunk of tree fern used as a mount. Lots of texture to grab hold of.
Maybe Lecanopteris lomarioides?
Microsorum punctatum ‘Dragon Whiskers’
I think this one may be Polypodium formosanum.
With textured fronds!
Super sexy…
This was interesting, the tag read Lemmaphyllum microphyllum, which I know as a little epiphytic fern with thick succulent leaves, yet these leaves were thin and more traditionally fern-like.
Microsorum thailandicum, aka blue oil fern.
Alocasia cuprea
Microgramma mauritiana ‘Laciniated’
And this final fuzzy fern is a mystery, if I remember correctly what had been growing in this container slowly disappeared, while this fern took over. It’s pretty cute…
Here’s Steven, posing with (I think) an Elaphoglossum metallicum. Meeting this guy and hanging out in his greenhouse was such a bright spot in an otherwise intense and overwhelming few weeks. Plant people are the best!

And the fun didn’t end there! Steven generously shared cuttings of a few of the ferns I lusted after. Here’s the Lemmaphyllum microphyllum that was different from the ones I already have.
Microgramma mauritina ‘Lanciniated’ (I cut the long leaves down to a smaller size since I’m trying to root them)
Here’s the small fuzzy NoID fern.
Keep in mind I have no idea what I’m doing here, please wish me luck rooting these babies!
Pyrrosia nummularifolia
And last (but not least!) the crested form of Pyrrosia longifolia. Thank you Steven!
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