WATU plants

[pontus]

Hello everyone.

Now back from Tanzania, I have updated my website with WATU plants available for sale. The WATU plant project was begun in 2010, with the aim of finding and raising unusual Tanzanian and african bulb sp which would be sold in europe in order to collect funds for the NGO WATU in Tanzania. This NGO works with helping poor children in the Moshi area of Tanazania to pay their school fees, food and books, but also at building schools and providing these with competent teachers and other infrastructures such as science labs.

In collaboration with Samuel Muchiwa, Local tanzanian nurseryman and head of a reforestation project on Mt Kilimanjaro, a plot of land has now been set aside for propagating these bulbs.

a small quantity is already available now, so I thought I would post a link here, to anyone who might be interested :

http://pontuswallstenplants.smugmug.com/Other/WATU-Plants/21268763_9Zjf8x#!i=2364896641&k=QLsb5XG

more info on the NGO WATU can be found here :



and on their website

www.e-watu.com

updates on the WATU plants project as well as a documentary explaining the project will soon be uploaded on my website as well.

Pontus

[Ezeiza]

Zephyranthes candida. Habranthus and Hymenocallis are not native to Tanzania. Sounds like a good project worht supporting but it will be better if misunderstandings are avoided. There must be great Tazanian bulbs but probably in remote areas.

[pontus]

Yes indeed, those sp are not native Tanzanian, but they have not been imported from South America to Europe for sale. What i meant with those was that they have all been raised from seed or vegetative propagation in Tanzania by local nurserymen. The habranthus sp Tanzania was raised from seed in a nursery from wild collected seed of naturalised plants in the Arusha region for example. Of course i dont know who planted the original plants in the arusha marshy area/woodland, and for how long they have been naturalised there, and if the original bulbs came from south america or europe..

In Tanzania there are some native crinum sp as well as native ammocharis sp, and a few other bulbs, but these are not only native to Tanzania, some can also be found in Uganda for instance. There are still  a few more "obscure bulb sp" in Tanzania that noone seems to be able to identify, but more info and possible ID's will follow on these as they flower and get identified.

Cryptostephanus haemanthoides grows in grassy scrub like savannah regions in Tanzania as well as in moist woodland edge fields and in between cracks in rocks in Uganda.

on Mt meru can be found quite a few unusual knipnofia sp, but i have not yet been informed if these are native sp or not, and if not, where the original seed/plants came from, still remains unknown...

more info will follow

Pontus