Lycoris squamigera in warm climates

Nathan Lange plantsman@comcast.net
Fri, 01 Aug 2014 19:18:55 PDT

Jane,

Lack of humidity? That could be yet another reason they don't grow in 
much of California.

One location worth mentioning is Santa Fe, New Mexico (USDA zone 6b) 
where L. squamigera reportedly flowers well:
http://santafebotanicalgarden.org/september-2010/
Santa Fe's warmest monthly average night temperature is 55F (13C) in 
July, 49F (9C) in June when the foliage may still be green, with day 
temps over 30F (17C) warmer:
http://weather.com/weather/wxclimatology/…
There are many locations in California which have much warmer average 
summer night temperature profiles than Santa Fe, but none come close 
to being as cold as Santa Fe in the winter or as humid as Santa Fe in 
the summer.

Nathan


At 09:47 AM 7/31/2014, you wrote:
>Some years ago I bought several species of Lycoris, including L. 
>squamigera, ......but none of them ever flowered. I assumed this was 
>due to their experiencing cool nights and low humidity in summer. 
>These conditions often adversely affect plants that have evolved in 
>humid-summer regions where night temperatures are not extremely 
>lower than day temperatures in summer. A typical example was the 
>past few days, with daytime highs around 90 degrees F and nighttime 
>lows around 60 degrees F.




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