Balcony Update (Pineapple Seedling!)

I just wanted to give a quick update on all the great happenings on my balcony!

First off, I'm very excited to say that I have officially germinated a pineapple seedling. Last year I bought a yummy pineapple that was apparently grown in Costa Rica, and found seeds along the edges of the pulp.  Most pineapples at the grocery store come from Hawaii and don't have seeds, since there are no hummingbirds to pollinate the flowers.  There are plenty of hummingbirds in Costa Rica though.
I hurriedly planted the seeds in a communal pot for epiphytic fruit, alongside my dragonfruit and rhipsalis seeds.  (rhipsalis berries are edible)  The dragonfruit sprouted in fall along with the rhipsalis, but I had just about given up on the pineapple seeds when I found a tiny rosette of stiff leaves the other day!  I didn't plant anything else in there, but after I double checked some photos online, I can say with certainty that it is a pineapple!  I know that planting slips is the easiest and quickest way to grow pineapples, but you don't understand!  I sprouted a bromeliad seed!  And pineapples are supposedly hard to grow from seed too, but it seems that all you have to do is wait a year or so.  Heres a blurry picture.

The pineapple seedling is the green speck out in the open.  Amazingly, it already has five leaves unfurled at that miniscule size.

You can see that my pink velvet banana seedlings are really taking off too!

I also decided to plant my pre-bonsai creeping fig in a carved out chunk of coquina limestone.  That way I can train it as a lithophyte, and make it cling to the rock as if its at the edge of existence.  Once I sculpt it into a gnarled tree form I can even plant it with some tiny orchids or bromeliads!  This will be one awesome centerpiece.

This is caterpillar grazed passionflower "lavender lady" that I got for a buck.  One day later and it was already starting to leaf out!  Although this variety only bears empty "maypop" fruits, I can still use it to pollinate my other passionflowers.  It will look pretty too.

This was labeled as "Thai ginger" but is actually alpinia galangal, the galangal of southeast Asian cuisine!  Its also one of the few gingers that actually blooms every year even if its been frozen back, so maybe I'll get flowers too!  This one's going alongside the culinary ginger and lemongrass in my courtyard garden.

Something else that's pretty cool but unphotographed is that my snake plant leaf cutting has finally sprouted too!  It won't have the yellow margins that its mother plant had, but I'm just excited that I managed to salvage a snake plant that got crown rot! 

Coming soon... Cold Hardy Palms at the Palm Arboretum!