PBS Forum

I don't have any experience with the species but I recommend you try! Use a paint brush, q-tip or anything else to pollinate it. Do it as many times as you can to increase chances of selfing. Good luck!

Quote from: janemcgary on April 25, 2024, 05:24:58 PMWhen I started my bulb collection around 1990, I bought and grew from seed many species of Crocus at my home near Portland, Oregon. I've lost a lot of them over the years (especially to field mice) and have tried to bring in replacements and new species as often as possible. I can't import corms any more, but I have new seedlings most years and keep them carefully. Mark Akimoff's Illahe Nursery in Oregon is growing many different Crocus species, including some from my collection. Sadly, little seed is now being collected and offered for sale, but perhaps importation of corms from Europe will occur soon.

I read about you in the bulb garden newsletter! I got a letter with some articles from the pbs yesterday! Great articles!

Dear members living in the EU,
The spring seed and bulb exchange is now closed for orders. Please wait with any payments until you receive your order together with a payment slip from Martin.
The next EU exchange will take place in autumn and will be announced through all the channels. Please do not send any material to Martin in the meantime.
We wish you happy growing and a good summer!
Uli and Martin

This could be my send off for April...these flowers as with many of my bulbs this season are smaller than typical! Not sure what it is with the weather this season that's caused this?

Gladiolus Cardinalis hybrid.

These are darker striking beautiful Gladiolus flowers.

Bottom pic is from May 2023.

Some information on my donation:
Amorphophallus linearis has long relatively thin rhizomes which should be planted vertically into deep pots. If the pot is not deep enough they will coil in the bottom or even try to push through the drainage holes which might damage the tuber. This species, like many others can be propagated by leaf cuttings, using not the entire leaf but only a segment of the finely divided leaf.

Dioscorea discolor: The tuber should be started as soon as possible with some bottom heat, otherwise it will take very long to sprout. It is fully dormant in winter and must be kept completely dry but the growing cycle goes well into late autumn/early winter. It is an easy plant and can be grown outdoors during warm weather, partial sun improves leaf coulours. A happy plant becomes quite big in one season, it is a climber which needs something to cling to.

Kohleria warczewiczii: splendid plant, colour combination is very special. Becomes big but can be kept to a managable size by re-starting it from cuttings. No dormancy, produces only very few rhizomes if at all. I sent in cuttings and would appreciate a feed back by those who received it. It is the first time I sent in cuttings and I would like to know if it works for you. This gesneriad is very easy to grow.

Sauromatum horsefieldii: I recommend growing it in a pot because the number of bulbils is enormous. It might become weedy in the right condition.

Spathantheum orbinyanum: large summer growing plant with attractive Acanthus like lush foliage, fully dry dormancy in winter. The flowers appear before the leaves and look like a small leaf on a long stalk. Only when you look under the "leaf! you will recognise a typical Aroid flower. Strange smell.

Following a question after my donation of Achimenes and other rhizomatous Gesneriads to the EU BX, here is how I get them through the winter.
In autumn I try to keep the vegetation going as long as possible after flowering. This ensures good and healthy rhizomes. I keep fertilizing with a general fertilizer rich in potassium to build up the scaly rhizomes. Once the plant goes dormant I stop watering immediately and move the pot into a room with about 12-15 degrees centigrade. The rhizomes remain in their pots in the substrate which should be completely dry. A trap to avoid is residual moisture in larger plastic pots which might lead to rot during dormancy. Overwintering the dormant pots in a cold but frost free greenhouse has led to almost total loss, it was too cold. Repotting takes place around this time of the year and the rhizomes are started with gentle bottom heat until shoots are visible. I do not store dormant rhizomes in bags: in paper bags they dry up too much and in plastic bags they might rot. Storage in the dry substrate has proven to be best.
The same procedure applies to Caladiom tubers, they are even more sensitive to too cold storage condition.
Attached is a picture of X Smithicodonia 'Heartland's Joy', a reliable hybrid

Quote from: Lee Poulsen on April 26, 2024, 02:56:15 PMH. cleo is IMO one of the easiest of the Mexican Hymenocallises to grow. And it seems to self-pollinate, and if you miss the seeds ripening, they fall off and sprout all on their own wherever they fall. I'm in the Los Angeles area, so I keep it where it gets watered all summer, since it is winter-dormant. I had a small pot of seedlings once that some animal knocked off a small table and I "lost" it among all the larger plants growing on the ground. I discovered it a couple of years later while weeding that area, and the small bulbs, many of them, were still growing leafed out with healthy bulbs in about one inch of soil since most of it got knocked out when it was knocked off the table it was on.

Lee: Do you grow it mostly in pots? I do all mine out in the garden (zone 8a, north suburban Atlanta). Trying to determine a good soil mix and how much sun it needs. Of course, not everything that does well on the west coast does well here, although Mexican Hymenocallis seem to do OK if I can get them enough sun (a problem on my wooded lot sometimes). 

Charles

H. cleo is IMO one of the easiest of the Mexican Hymenocallises to grow. And it seems to self-pollinate, and if you miss the seeds ripening, they fall off and sprout all on their own wherever they fall. I'm in the Los Angeles area, so I keep it where it gets watered all summer, since it is winter-dormant. I had a small pot of seedlings once that some animal knocked off a small table and I "lost" it among all the larger plants growing on the ground. I discovered it a couple of years later while weeding that area, and the small bulbs, many of them, were still growing leafed out with healthy bulbs in about one inch of soil since most of it got knocked out when it was knocked off the table it was on.

Arnold: Nothing? I think it is just a couple of pages. Thanks.

Charles

Hi, Tractema lilio-hyacinthus is very different, as Jan said:

https://www.asturnatura.com/photo/_files/photogallery/7d3e72a4480f93c7ecba2b520fdc7aba.jpg

https://d2seqvvyy3b8p2.cloudfront.net/a1a8042ac2319073e1f4107cb42f9fe5.jpg