As muhc as I LOVE the idea of starting from seed, I have had mixed success. It would help so much if we had a section of the Wiki with directions for starting each kind of seed. It would be a huge project, I know, but oh so helpful!
> On Dec 27, 2025, at 12:52 PM, Robert Parks via pbs <pbs@lists.pacificbulbsociety.net> wrote:
>
> So true about plants geophytes glowing far out of their normal locations...
> Andean tuber crops from 10-14K thriving in sea level SF with summer water,
> OK similar temperatures. Presumably, I'd be able to grow other plants from
> that regime.
> Pulsatilla vulgaris, that acts like it is eternal springtime in SF.
> A lowland tropical aroid (Amorphophallus ongsakulii) that thrives in year
> round cool tropical conditions with dry dormancy. There must be some
> residual cool tolerance there.
> And all the geophytes that really don't seem to care that their normal
> dormancy conditions aren't attended to.
>
>
> On Sat, Dec 27, 2025, 12:07 PM Jane McGary via pbs <
> pbs@lists.pacificbulbsociety.net> wrote:
>
>> Thanks to Lee Poulsen for two interesting posts. Of course, if you want
>> a selected clone, you need to buy vegetatively propagated plant
>> material. I'm more interested in natural species and their variability,
>> so I rarely do that. I've also found that some named clones are not
>> visibly different from plants grown from wild seed. For instance,
>> Narcissus romieuxii 'Julia Jane' appeared identical to seedlings from
>> wild collections from the same general area. Commercial bulb growers
>> tend to name clones, or strains, to make them more attractive to
>> customers, even if their stock is not visually different from typical
>> forms. (They may have selected forms that increase rapidly by
>> offsetting.) If you donate seed of a named form to an exchange, it can't
>> be listed under the cultivar (clone or strain) name, but "ex" ('from')
>> can precede that name.
>>
>> Second, sorry to disappoint you, but even on the coast in the Pacific
>> Northwest, we have summer heat waves -- increasingly so. However, I've
>> noticed a fascinating related effect: high alpines can be grown
>> successfully at sea level in some places on the North Atlantic coast.
>> This didn't really surprise me, since I lived for a long time in Alaska
>> and knew that plants I saw at 10,000 feet in the Rocky Mountains were
>> growing at 2,000 feet in the mountains of interior Alaska (where it can
>> still get warm in summer). Temperature is only one variable in whether a
>> plant will succeed. Seasonality is another, and some plants just seem to
>> require a long winter dormancy with the protection of consistent snow.
>> Others can't tolerate low summer humidity, gradually declining over a
>> few years of warm days and sharply cooler nights (one theory is that the
>> temperature drop triggers the onset of dormancy). If you grow your bulbs
>> in a temperature-controlled greenhouse, with careful attention to
>> watering, there may still be variables you're unable to control without
>> a laboratory growth chamber.
>>
>> Even plant species that are narrowly endemic may have genetic
>> variability hidden in their genome. Brought into cultivation, they can
>> surprise us with their adaptation to conditions different from their
>> homes. We won't know until we try them. I believe growing from seed
>> gives us a good chance of identifying positive adaptations.
>>
>> Jane McGary, Portland, Oregon, USA
>>
>> On 12/26/2025 7:16 PM, Lee Poulsen via pbs wrote:
>>> Since I have had the experience of trying to shift bulbs from the
>> opposite hemisphere, and have been moderately successful (maybe 2/3 of the
>> attempts), I have always wondered if it would have been easier with the
>> ones I failed with if I could have only grown them in those rare but
>> existent climates where it basically never gets hot in the summer. Places
>> like the coastal Pacific Northwest of the US in Washington state or
>> northern Oregon, or San Francisco city, or that area near Monterey Bay
>> where they grow artichokes, lettuce, and broccoli all summer long for the
>> produce market, or far northwestern California along the coast in places
>> like Eureka or Crescent City, or coastal British Columbia in Canada, or
>> Scotland to name a few. Maybe we could contract with some of our members
>> living in those areas to switch our imported bulbs from the southern
>> hemisphere for us. 😊
>>>
>>> --Lee Poulsen
>>> San Gabriel Valley, California, USA - USDA Zone 10a
>>> Latitude 34°N, Altitude 340 ft/100 m
>>>
>>>>> A vexing problem when obtaining bulbs from the southern hemisphere is
>> that of acclimatizing them to a reversal of the seasons. Often they are
>> shipped just before growth is beginning in the southern hemisphere and one
>> must choose between allowing growth to commence and hope they will tolerate
>> the higher or lower temperatures involved in this "off-season" period, or
>> attempting to prolong their dormancy until the proper season arrives and
>> hope they do not become too desiccated (as is more likely to happen in very
>> young bulbs). Our experience has been with winter-growing bulbs and we have
>> tried both methods with mixed and often unhappy results. Some general
>> principles have been derived.
>>>>>
>>>>> When imported bulbs are allowed to begin growth out of season, their
>> growing period is usually short as they will go dormant as heat increases
>> and, I believe, especially when night time temperatures remain elevated
>> (and some will be prone to rot if their soil remains moist at this time. As
>> a consequence, their following resting period is also abbreviated ---
>> perhaps only two or three months --- before their winter finally arrives.
>> Restarting them after so short a dormancy can result in poor growth or none
>> at all. (One very fine Gethyllis was given up as a lost cause when it made
>> no appearance at all the first winter, but has since thrived and
>> multiplied.)
>>>>>
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