Gardening with Wilson

HortPark’s exhibition area showcased mainly exotic plants in this year’s Singapore Garden Festival (SGF) that took place at the Suntec Convention Center. Their exhibition area was not a big one but it was packed with a myraid of different plants.

The exhibition area has a winding path which visitors could walk on and on both sides, a number of notable plants were placed and showcased on cubical pedestals and they were accompanied by informative plant tags. I saw a couple of interesting bromeliads that are part of the huge collection belonging to the Gardens by the Bay, dish gardens that featured some succulents and carnivorous plants as well as an aquascape consisting of aquatic mosses.

Visitors who walked through the HortPark exhibit might have missed the three planted chandeliers that were hanging above their heads. These were the creations made by several HortPark staff who painstakingly constructed them over several days before the Festival opened. Do not forget to check out the planted border that surrounded the HortPark exhibition area as there are interesting plants to see and photograph!

Amongst the plants that surround the rectangular exhibition area was a shrub that featured showy heads of yellowish threads that are quite hard to miss. A plant from the Acanthaceae family, it is botanically known as Schaueria flavicoma. It’s common name is known as the Golden Plume and was introduced into Singapore by the current President of the Singapore Gardening Society, Mr John Tan. This plant is already available for sale in local nurseries.

Another interesting plant which I have seen being featured was a variegated spiral ginger from the Costaceae family. It is likely to be the variegated version of Costus varzearum because the physical appearance and morphological characteristics of the plant bear great resemblance with that of that species of Costus.

There was a delightful prayer plant on display which I have seen before only in Western houseplant books. It is known as Calathea crocata which I believe HortPark has imported from overseas for the show. Unlike other more flamboyant foliage calathea varieties, C. crocata has rather dark-coloured but plain leaves with wavy margins but it stood out from the crowd due to the striking bright yellow inflorescences.

There are several Curcuma cultivars (Zingiberaceae) on display as well. The first was a cultivar of the popular and rather common Siam tulip, C. alismatifolia, that produces inflorescence that is coloured light pink. There was another that borne bracts that were coloured purple but there was one cultivar that caught my eye, which was the plant that produces inflorescences where the lower bracts were covered with a brownish tinge while the upper ones were whitish.

There was also a variegated version of the Golden Chain Tree, Lophanthera lactescens, from the Malpighiaceae family that was put on display. The leaves of this tree are splashed with random patches of a golden yellow colour.

A beautiful, variegated Wandering Jew Plant with pink and white stripes that ran across the usual purple leaves was also spotted. This plant, which is from the Commelinaceae family, was labelled with the botanical name, Tradescantia fluminensis ‘Quadricolor’ and common name given as the “Four-coloured Wandering Jew”.

Last but not least, HortPark also exhibited some colonies of turtle moss, Leucobryum juniperoideum (Leucobryaceae) that were planted on a turtle-shaped sculpture. It was a very appropriate planting style and visitors who had seen this would definitely have a lasting impression of the moss.