PBS Forum

Quote from: Sylvia on July 04, 2024, 08:02:08 AMRobert -

My Zephs (can't spell the rest of the name in any case) over many years have bloomed precisely once.  The few pots I've retained have foliage now but as for buds, nada.

What am I not doing or am doing that's counter productive?

I don't get great blooms on mine...but I do get some. I get better blooming with potted plants (pots warm in the sun) and I can give them intermittent water, let them go dry, and then have an occasional "thunderstorm". The ones in the ground are in a sunny corner with occasional watering, but more regular tree rain from the fog, often those bloom late summer/fall when the soil finally dries out. Like I said, not great blooming, but there will be a few sprinkling of flowers after rain events. I'm going to put a buch of them out in the street median and see if they will flower in the fall with the beginning rains.

Robert
in pleasant breezy San Francisco, where the past two warm days have helped the summer bulbs that crave warmth.

(argh, failed to attach images!)

Aha! Another Haemanthus snuck in a bloom on the storage bench... H. humilis v. hirsutus...got some hairy leg action going on there.

Typhonium circinnatum with a curly spathe inside, next to Amorphophallus ongsakulii starting a summer of intermittent blooming...not shy one shots like the big relatives.

Gloxinia nematanthodes Evita is stating that this is a hanging basket kind of year.

And the Dieramas are coming into bloom nicely, but the wind never stops, so pictures are difficult.

Robert
in currently sunny San Francisco, looking to a couple days in the high 70sF/25+C...at least the Dieramas won't melt in the fog this week!

The Bomareas are messy vines, but all is forgiven (B. aff. superba, B. sp. Fiesta)

Little bitty Ornithogalums are doing their thing, not pictured O. britteniae with a 25cm inflorescence over a barely 2 cm plant.

Haemanthus humilis making a surprise from the storage bench.

Arisaema candidisssimum Pink rushing to bloom before July...all of them are on the same schedule.

Arisaema af. consanguineum Dark Leaf, always with the curvy pseudostem.

Also not pictured, Biarum tenuifolium (focus issues), looking nice with the sun glowing through the red spathe. My climate seems to prompt a very extended bloom season for Biarum. Roscoea tibetica also didn't want its tiny picture taken.

Everything fairly seasonal although all the Arisaemas are late this year.

The Haemanthus is from SX seed.

Drimia nana...very small and very cute!

Quote from: Uli on June 25, 2024, 12:57:57 AMThank you for posting the pictures of flowering potatoes. What are they? Local cultivars of edible potato? Or wild species? I know that the edible potato originated in the Andes of Peru and Bolivia but I am not aware of native Californian ones. How does the whole plant look like?
I managed to acquire a species potato Solanum jamesii which looks like a white flowered mini potato plant. For safety reasons I keep it in a pot, because of bulb/tuber eating rodents and also because I know of a botanical garden where a purple flowering species has invaded the whole garden.....

Genetics based on cultivated Andean potatoes. Virtually all of these are from seed of selected cultivars sourced from Cultivariable in Washington state, USA. In general, my choice was for plants suited for cool summers, late tuberization (after fall equinox), and strong dormancy.
Plants are generally sprawling and very vigorous, a few clones grew tall and upright this spring (it was very dark and cold for a while). A few seedlings in a planter are now a lush mound a meter across (seed planted in April). Flowering and seed set is generous the local pollinators do buzz pollen collection. Everything is in planters, and escape us unlikely, given the local conditions.

Quote from: Martin Bohnet on June 24, 2024, 11:54:46 AM@Robert_Parks love that blue potato. I once tried blue-fleshed potatoes, but they flowered pale lilac for me.

Flower color is not strongly linked to tuber/flesh color in potato, although if stem color is also unpigmented, it isn't going to be a bright potato. It is fun playing with these, the diversity of resulting tubers from more less focused seed.

Robert
Clear, brisk, and windy on the hill in SF.

Arisaema cf. consanguineum Dark Leaf and a few views of the grove of Amorphophallus ongsakulii inside.

Not a lot of excitement with the Amorphophallus yet (I started them late, and it's been cold once they get outside), so I think I'll put in a batch of pretty summer bulb flowers that are keeping the local bumblebees happy: (mostly) Indigenous varieties of potato. They flower and set seed fairly easily. Very fast to bloom from seed or tuber.

Quote from: petershaw on June 04, 2024, 05:13:33 PMI am trying to get my seedling and donated bulb pots divided and came across some with very fleshy roots.

Lots of others seem pretty straightforward and will go into paper bags for the summer.

I had three Ferraria species that didn't come up from donated corms. Some pupated (which seems like a lack of chilling or dormancy?) but no vegetative growth.

Also Moraea polyanthos failed to sprout but the corms look fine.

What's the idea planting depth for Ferraria?

I am behind and was hoping to get a number of packets of various species for the BX but may not make it.

Paper bags, lots and lots of small topless plastic containers on shelves, plastic compartment boxes. Or parked in dry potting mix in next year's pots on shelves.

Ferraria may require warm summer dormancy, I've had F. crispa corms dormant for years (until donated to BX).

Many winter bulbs do require warm dormancy, and will do a variety of things if they don't get it. Fail to break dormancy, grow poorly, don't flower or flower weakly, rot, proliferate into vast numbers of tiny bulblets, grow new bulbs without vegetation. 

I've removed most Lachenalia from my collection because I can't satisfy their summer dormancy easily. A few things get potted and parked on top of the grow lights inside. Other pots will get dry sun outdoors...I'll find out in the fall if that is enough.

Some bulbs love deep...and you have to notice in lifting or repotting, and use appropriate pots...which means you have to have an array of pots, from pan to tree pot.

Finally got the BX package done...today. So I can start prepping for the next BX because there are a lot of pots yet to be dormant.

Robert
in cool, sunny SF, still with geophyte flowers, moving from the winter growers to the summers, including a broad range of colors on potatoes (from true seed, Andean varieties).

Quote from: petershaw on May 17, 2024, 06:16:35 AMI have a lot of pots with lots of young bulbs, most winter growers. They have just recently gone dormant (some are still "growing").

I had hoped to share many of them via the Bulb Ex but I am wondering if this is the right time to divide them? I thought I understood they should be kept undisturbed until mid summer, but I am open to clarification.

I second that. The ones that have dropped leaves generally have mature bulbs, rooty things go to a warm shelf for a time. Generally if the tops are totally dry and done they are OK with lifting. It's a little frustrating with the Lachenalias I am attempting to turf out of the collection, as they skip leaves and flowers but still grow roots (in the absence of a hot summer).

Robert
hoping for a sunny day so I can see the rose colored Tritonia squalida.

There are some populations of Calochortus albus that only bloom for a couple years after a forest fire, then put up a leaf every year or so in the deep shade, very very slowly building up energy storage for the paroxysm of blooming and chance at reproduction.

In less unfavorable locations, they tend to have some sort of bloom synchronization (presumably a weather trigger) so there is a group blooming every several years rather than a yearly dribble. It may be that the cultivated ones aren't getting their trigger satisfied even though the bulb is blooming size.

Quote from: Too Many Plants! on May 09, 2024, 08:52:50 PMVery nice. Loving that Tritonia squalida !

Windows! To go along with some of the Arisaemas.

Robert
in pleasant cool San Francisco, where the very last of the summer bulbs are about to get potted up.

A few pretties from the last few days.
Inside - Typhonium circinnatum
Variously outside - deformed Zantedeschia aethiopica, Ornithogalum gracilis, fall color (well, spring color) on Oxalis pardalis, Tritonia squalida, Ixia polystycha, Lachenalia multifolia, and Pelargonium undulata.

Robert
 in unseasonally warm San Francisco, 80F/27C, but the wind changed and now it is more normal.

I have a couple forms, but the nurseries I got them from didn't seem to have them the last time I looked.

Robert
in SF, where they are blooming heavily and keeping ahead of the slugs leafwise.

In cool foggy San Francisco, I've had decent success with Babiana, Sparaxis, and Ixia when purchased/delivered in late spring. Mind you I am heat zone 2 and hardiness zone 10a. Berkeley can, of course, be quite a bit warmer.

Anyway, I plant them fairly deep in larger pots, and set the pots in the ground...this keeps the soil relatively cooler, while the tops can enjoy bright sunlight...a light colored top dressing might help. I plant them immediately on arrival. In my conditions they sprout quickly, flower, and eventually go dormant. I lift them and store them warm and then plant them with the rest of the winter bulbs in the fall. The grow on a normal winter cycle thereafter.

Sparaxis tends to run quickly through the cycle, Babiana grows more or less normally well into the summer before going dormant (Mark Twain's quote about the coldest winter was a summer in SF). Ixia, at least the commercial varieties will grow entirely out of season, blooming and growing leaves ignoring the date! For me, I get good bulb increase and copious bulblets from cool summer growing of Ixias. Your results will likely vary if you don't have summer nights averaging 60F or below.

Very few of the big USA bulb importers/sellers ship winter growing bulbs appropriately, shipping late in the fall, or even in the spring. Heck, they mostly don't even ship fall blooming crocus or colchicum appropriately. The few specialist mediterranean bulb sellers ship appropriately, but they generally don't carry the cheap commonly available garden hybrids. One of the better ways of getting them is haunting the local garden centers/nurseries and snatching up the mediterranean bulbs early (usually well before retail mail order ships). And, of course, as a member of PBS, the summer Bulb Exchanges lean heavily towards winter growers.

Robert
in cool San Francisco, where the great dormancy race is beginning