Scottish Rock Garden Club Forum
Bulbs => Galanthus => Topic started by: steve owen on December 12, 2008, 09:49:07 AM
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The Northumberland yellow galanthus - does anyone know where in Northumberland they originated? Its a big county! And is the fact that they occurred there, and another group of yellows at Wandlebury near Cambridge, thought to be pure coincidence, or is there something common to these locations in terms of soil type or whatever?
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When I was in Northumberland a few years ago the yellows were present most times we stopped to look at snowdrops. I would say it's genetics that leads to so many.
Yellow is usually a recessive colour, I used to breed parakeets crossing various colours to produce desireable colours, and needs two recessive genes for yellow to be present to produce yellow. I'll not go into detail. Where there is a good poplulation of yellows there is enough yellow genes to keep the yellow population going. A single yellow in a wood will not produce yellows quickly
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John Richards will have the Yellow Snowdrops of Northumberland as his topic for one of the talks the RBGE Galanthus Day..... see here for more details: http://www.srgc.org.uk/smf/index.php?topic=2597.msg59338;topicseen#msg59338 so perhaps you need to be making a journey north to learn more, Steve!
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Mark, did you get good results from crossing parakeets with snowdrops?
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.....maybe white ones with little green marks? :P
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No none at all.
I'm only guessing that yellow in snowdrops is recessive just like it is in e.g. budgies unless it is sex-linked but that I cant remember. Cross pollinating yellow snowdrops with yellow snowdrops could lead to sick plants as it does with parakeets. Martin maybe knows more.
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.....maybe white ones with little green marks? :P
Not so much a snowdrop poll as a snowdrop polly?
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So far nobody has mentioned that the Northumberland yellows are Galanthus nivalis whilst the Wandlebury yellows are a different species, Galanthus plicatus. I live a few miles from Wandlebury and the underlying rock in this area is chalk, so the soil tends to be alkaline. I think the Northumberland yellows tend to occur on acid soil.
I seem to remember Joe Sharman saying at a talk that he has not met with any success in trying to cross-breed Wendy's Gold (the most famous/readily available of the Wandlebury yellows) with other snowdrops, for example to produce a yellow version of Trym. If the yellow colouration were controlled by a single recessive gene and the outer markings of Trym by another gene, then although the first generation of a Trym x Wendys would all be green, a quarter of the next generation ({Trym x Wendys} X {Trym x Wendys}) should be yellow. I don't know if breeding attempts have got this far.
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a quarter of the next generation ({Trym x Wendys} X {Trym x Wendys}) should be yellow.
I don't know if it works the same in Galanthus, but here, in rhododendron, a cross of (x x y) x (x x z) is more successful to achieve such results without losing vigour. That's assuming x, y and z are species and not hybrids. So perhaps (plicatus Trym x nivalis Savill Gold) x (plicatus Trym x a yellow elwesii) would be worth a try or (plicatus Trym x plicatus Wendy's Gold) x (plicatus Trym x plicatus Bill Clarke). Just a thought. ???
Had an email from a Scottish friend today saying they at long last found a brain in England but it was 2,000 years old. I was puzzled until I saw the news tonight.
johnw
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I am from Northumberland - where do people go to look for snowdrops in my county?
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woods, copses and graveyards. All the yellows we saw that day were left in place.
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re: Northumberland graveyard.
Lovely shots Mark.
Thanks
johnw - +17c here yesterday and very blustery, +2c today and going to -7 to -9c tonight. Trillium grandiflorum double poking up at its peril. Helleborus niger in full bloom.
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a quarter of the next generation ({Trym x Wendys} X {Trym x Wendys}) should be yellow.
I don't know if it works the same in Galanthus, but here, in rhododendron, a cross of (x x y) x (x x z) is more successful to achieve such results without losing vigour. That's assuming x, y and z are species and not hybrids. So perhaps (plicatus Trym x nivalis Savill Gold) x (plicatus Trym x a yellow elwesii) would be worth a try or (plicatus Trym x plicatus Wendy's Gold) x (plicatus Trym x plicatus Bill Clarke). Just a thought. ???
Had an email from a Scottish friend today saying they at long last found a brain in England but it was 2,000 years old. I was puzzled until I saw the news tonight.
johnw
Using 'x' and 'y' in a cross should be avoided unless you are talking males and females, and then there is the use of 'x' for cross, which adds to the confusion. There are plenty of other letters in the alphabet. A x B works; x x y doesn't. ???
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.....a cross of (x x y) x (x x z) is more successful to achieve such results....
Using 'x' and 'y' in a cross should be avoided unless you are talking males and females, and then there is the use of 'x' for cross, which adds to the confusion. There are plenty of other letters in the alphabet. A x B works; x x y doesn't. ???
Anthony
I am glad you explained that - I was confused by (x x y) x (x x z) - I thought must be some sort of triple cross happening on each side. Now I understand it was (a x b) x (a x c). 8)
Thank you.
John
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.....a cross of (x x y) x (x x z) is more successful to achieve such results....
Using 'x' and 'y' in a cross should be avoided unless you are talking males and females, and then there is the use of 'x' for cross, which adds to the confusion. There are plenty of other letters in the alphabet. A x B works; x x y doesn't. ???
Anthony
I am glad you explained that - I was confused by (x x y) x (x x z) - I thought must be some sort of triple cross happening on each side. Now I understand it was (a x b) x (a x c). 8)
Thank you.
John
John / Anthony
Apologies for the confusion. You see for starters I intended (X x Y) x (X x Z). Anthony is correct, the obvious ABC should have been used. This explains why a brain has not yet been found in Nova Scotia.
In rhodos you tend to get a few seeds and fewer healthy seedlings from such crosses; still more seeds than you would get with an F2 cross like ({Trym x Wendys} seedling #1 X {Trym x Wendys} seedling #2) or (Trym x Wendys) selfed. An F2 can occasionally produce spectacular results .
johnw - +17c yesterday, -9c tonight, +9c on Monday.
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I'm no good with X Y Z or my A, B, C's but +17 to -9 = OUCH !!!!
p.s. BEAUTIFUL yellow snowdrops
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I but +17 to -9 = OUCH !!!!
/quote]
Rob - So said the Trillium. And still -6c at 10:45 Sunday morning. These we take in our stride as not one of our more dramatic plunges. In the days of Fahrenheit in the late 70's or early 80's on Boxing Day it was raining and 55F at 3pm, by 10pm we were at -4F. Boston dropped to -9F. Now that was carnage.
johnw
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Galanthophile:
Northumberland yellow snowdrops can be seen, if you can spot them, during the Howick Gardens snowdrop days, usually late Jan/earlyFeb. I think they only open weekends though. Details will no doubt be on their web site.
Maggi: John spoke to us at our NCCPG meeting yesterday, topic was wild flowers of Northumberland, and of course, amongst the dozens of orchids and so on, showed us the yellows. He said he has found them growing wild around Hexham, but I know they have loads at Howick too.
He did mention one other place, and I believe he knows where the first were found too, but as a galanthophobe, I didn't pay much attention ;D They look like snowdrops with the flu to me, in need of a good tonic!
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Here's a second thought that applies to rhodos only and with obvious exceptions. This was passed along to me by a famous rhodo and magnolia breeder and concerns the inheritance of yellow. He insisted that the maternal parent should always be the yellow on all sides of the cross. He got very close to achieving a yellow evergreen azalea by injecting a yellow deciduous azalea into the formula. Close but sterility raised its ugly head before he got to his final cross.
So for instance in Galanthus the proposed cross below would not be acceptable:
({Trym x Wendys} seedling #1 X {Trym x Wendys} seedling #2)
Nor would:
({Wendys x Trym} seedling #1 X {Trym x Wendys} seedling #2)
Nor would:
[({Wendys x Trym} seedling #1 X {Trym x Wendys} seedling #2)] x {Wendys x Trym} seedling #3
But this is how he would proceed:
({Wendys x Trym} seedling #1 X {Wendys x Trym} seedling #2)
or
[({Wendys x Trym} seedling #1 X {Wendys x Trym} seedling #2)] x {Wendys x Trym} seedling #3
Of course in rhodos the yellow flower pigment may be an entirely different matter than the inheritance of the yellow ovary and markings of Galanthus. Further complicating the matter is that in eastern North America we have to breed for hardiness as well as yellow at the same time. It is always difficult to decide which is the more important factor maternally, it could be the flower shape of Trym is the difficult one to get. A bit like the lottery.
For what it's worth.
johnw
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I have been really intersted in these insights into plant breeding. My understanding is that there is a high probability that Trym seedlings share its characteristics. I suspect this has been observed most often with Trym as the female parent because galanthophiles often leave their plant breeding to nature. However I understand there is a low probability that first generation crosses with Wendy's Gold are yellow.
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I've seen some nice drifts of snowdrops in Northumberland in graveyards - one of the few places they can grow undisturbed I think!
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I've seen some nice drifts of snowdrops in Northumberland in graveyards - one of the few places they can grow undisturbed I think!
Yes, Ann, I think you're right.... some graveyards with good crocus drifts, too. 8)
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One problem I foresee Ann is people stripping the yellows from the graveyards and woods as white fever spreads further.