February 2025

Started by Too Many Plants!, February 02, 2025, 11:25:10 AM

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Too Many Plants!

I know this one is near and dear to @Carlos 's heart. Bought as Urginea Maritima, but Carlos says is not Maritima. And the genus has been moved.

In any event, thought I would share this BEAST of a bulb. Today from the original bulb planted as a single head 5 gal a few years ago, has become a four headed 5' X 4' X 3' tall monster of a bulb!

Urginea Maritima  (Carlos can correct this for me...).

Carlos

#1
Hi, yes, that's Drimia numidica. It does not offset very often, that's a nice clump.

Let me say something about "moving genera".

According to the code, if a name fulfils some requirements when published (i.e. it has a protologue in Latin or -from 2007- in English, it is published in a book or journal with an ISSN, for new taxa a holotype is designated and a specimen is deposited in a herbarium, etc.) the name is "validly published" and it can be used. That does not render the name "correct", but you can use it if you think it is.

So "Urginea" was "validly published" in 1834 by a French author (despite his German surname), Steinheil, and we can use it if we think that Mediterranean species do not belong in Drimia. But according to Goldblatt and Manning, all "Urginea" are grouped with SA species of Drimia, so there's not really a need to split the genus (and of course not to split it into the myriad of microgenera that the Austrian Speta and Pfosser and my colleagues from the next province have created).

There's two additional problems if you accept Urginea:

1. the type of the genus is Urginea fugax, and in 1836 Steinheil created the genus Squilla for the rest of Mediterranean plants, as he believed that they did not belong in Urginea sensu stricto. But as it is very similar to "Scilla" (though pronounced with a sounding U, so it's different phonetically), Squilla was neglected for decades and all species were placed in Urginea. Then Speta created Charybdis to house all species except U. fugax, because of the controversy Squilla / Scilla. This did not have much acceptance, though Charybdis glaucophylla from Sardinia was initially described as belonging in this genus.

2. It was not until until 2016 that Martínez et al. requested a binding decission from the Committee of Nomenclature.  The Committee decided that in the end Squilla is sufficiently distinct from Scilla not to be confused, so that leaves Charybdis as a later synonym, and the plants should be named Squilla IF they are proved to be different from Urginea fugax, ant that IS STILL NOT CLEAR. If they are sufficiently close phylogenetically, all should be Urginea, or all should be Drimia.

I have the help of a Portuguese Phd in molecular biology and we have spent almost 2 years gathering samples and trying to solve the jigsaw puzzle, I can only say that some results are surprising.

So personallly I prefer to use Drimia for everything until we are done with the study. But you can use Squilla. You can even use Urginea for U. fugax for the time being....

Sorry if it seems complicated, I did not mess all up. I just try to understand and shed some light.

Thanks to Dylan Hannon, who will be sending some very, very important samples for the study, and thus saving me one  or more trips to Morocco (which I'd love to visit , anyway).

Carlos








Carlos Jiménez
Valencia, Spain, zone 10
Dry Thermomediterranean, 450 mm

Carlos

Something less dense:

Narcissus cantabricus, ex Dylan Hannon after four years. I think that this is a Spanish strain.

20250203_181832.jpg
20250203_181820.jpg

And two hybrids

N × bastitanus, again

20250203_182302.jpg


N × montielanus (blancoi × coronatus = pallidulus)

20250203_181952.jpg

Carlos Jiménez
Valencia, Spain, zone 10
Dry Thermomediterranean, 450 mm

Arnold

#3
Very nice Carlos.  Is it scented?

 Ferraria variabilis.
Arnold T.
North East USA

Carlos

Hi

Cantabricus: foxy smell, rather unpleassnt

Bastitanus: lighter foxy smell, sometimes more pleasant

Montielanus: good smell

Carlos Jiménez
Valencia, Spain, zone 10
Dry Thermomediterranean, 450 mm

Arnold

Carlos

thank you, scent has become more important to me in the last ten years.
Arnold T.
North East USA

Carlos

#6
Interesting. My smell has always been good, something that I shared with my mother. She only used very faint fragrances as many could cause her a headache, and I'm the same.

Smell has been neglected by botanists as dried plants only smell of dry plants, but in Narcissus it is tremendously important. Well, quite important.

For example, different strains of bulbocodium have marked differences, from no smell to an 'insecticide' smell going through a quite pleasant one. Of course, to some extent it depends on each nose...

My last suprise was with calcicola, which has a mixture of paint and some other chemical. I wonder which insects are attracted to that. But cuatrecasasii in the same section  has a pleasant smel...
Carlos Jiménez
Valencia, Spain, zone 10
Dry Thermomediterranean, 450 mm

CG100

#7
Strange..................

I have always bought for scent, no matter the plant. I am as likely to pass along a row of roses, for instance, in a nursery smelling each, as looking at the blooms.
One great shame is that the now near ubiquitous Tete-a-Tete lost its scent when being bulked up for sale on a massive scale. Back when it was new and scarce, maybe 25 years ago, the flowers had a glorious scent, all that I have smelt over the past 10+ years have had none.

If I buy the hybrid florists' Cyclamen, usually around Christmas, I scour the benches of hundreds/thousands to find a scented one, which are usually pink or white and can smell glorious, a bit like cloves. If there are other scents, they tend to smell of warm plastic, so phthalate ester smell (plasticisers used in some plastics), sort of oily-fruity.

One non-bulb that can have glorious scent is Primula florindae. I have never known the red-flowered form to have a scent, but most yellow ones smell glorious. One down side - it is usually short-lived, but usually flowers profusely and sets loads of seed.

The small-growing Setiechinopsis mirabilis (a cactus), is night-blooming and is scented very much like mothballs (naphthalene) - that must surely be polinated by moths, despite the secnt?

Mikent

Quote from: CG100 on February 04, 2025, 12:13:59 AMThe small-growing Setiechinopsis mirabilis (a cactus), is night-blooming and is scented very much like mothballs (naphthalene) - that must surely be polinated by moths, despite the secnt?
Maybe it's pollinated by bats. Though I can't imagine they'd like that scent much either.

CG100

#9
Pssibly, but it flowers at just 3-4 inches tall (and taller), so any bat would probably have to operate a bit like vampire bats - land on the ground nearby and shuffle to the flower.

The flower itself would not take any weight - long tubed and no really huge size.

Arnold

Moreae polystachya

Blooms get bigger as the season progresses
Arnold T.
North East USA

Too Many Plants!


Too Many Plants!

Quote from: Arnold on February 04, 2025, 07:04:00 AMMoreae polystachya

Blooms get bigger as the season progresses

I have far more spent stems and open seed pods than flowers now. Mine have been going since August (I think), and are winding down in February.

Carlos

Hi @CG100 

I'd like to send you some seeds of greatly scented Narcissus. You should smell broussonetii, also jonquilla and obsoletus.

Tête-à-tête is basically a pseudonarcissus, so wild seeds should give scented plants. I have a bit old seeds which I could send now, if you have cool springs they could still grow a bulb big enough to survive the summer. I can ask for fresh seeds to sow in autumn, as well.
Carlos Jiménez
Valencia, Spain, zone 10
Dry Thermomediterranean, 450 mm

CG100

Hi @Carlos 

Many thanks.
This is the UK - we can always arrange cool weather, or at least cool positions should the rare happen and it is warm/hot   :)

Have you any experience of jonquilla that is in trade? If you do, is it actually jonquilla, and is the scent correct?

Another tip for those interested in great scent, non-bulb, almost tuberous - Tiarella. Probably most plants labelled this in cultivation/trade are x.Heucherella, but keep sniffing and some have amazing scent - prefect for a shady, moist spot in the garden.
Or Petasites paradoxus - people see "Petasites" and start to run, fast, but I only wish that it was invasive, sadly it isn't. You need to get on your knees to smell the fabulous scent - it looks a bit like a broomrape and the flower spike makes no more than 4-6 inches, before the very decorative leaves.