Sternbergia 2008

[art600]

Hans

Have you tried to use pollen from the wild lutea to pollinate your clump?

[Hans J]

I second Art, Hans, beautiful group !  Do they flower so profusely each year, even after a lousy Summer like this year's ??

Luc ,we had not such a bad summer ...here it was OK ...the only we had not temperatues over 35° C , but we must not have this ....
please - we live near the warmest city from Germany ( 40 km ) ....and here growing Bananas  

[Hans J]

Art :

I will not mix this two S.lutea .....I hope I can make later pollinate this plants from the wild ....

  I will not produce more hybrids .....

[Hans A.]

That one bulb produces a few flowers i knew, but i was surprised to find the first lutea for this year in the garden - two buds on one stem. cannot remember to have seen this before...  may be I did not pay enough attention before?

[art600]

Art :

I will not mix this two S.lutea .....I hope I can make later pollinate this plants from the wild ....

  I will not produce more hybrids .....

Hans
I think you are right - the 'sterile' one seems to clump up well, so no need to produce seed. 

[Gerry Webster]

Sternbergia identity -

I recently posted (Sept 14th, post no 34) a pic of a plant, given to me by the late Erna & Ronald Frank, which I identified as S. greuteriana. I now think this plant is more likely to be the much rarer S. pulchella from Syria. Those interested might care to look at an account by Erna  of a trip to Syria  with Manfred Koenen  in which they found S. pulchella (in AGS  Bulletin  vol 64 no 4, Dec 1996). Brian Mathew provides an  account of S. pulchella in 'The Garden' vol 118, pt 1 (Jan 1993) & my plant corresponds closely, though not exactly, to his description.

[Armin]

Hi Gerry,
I can't find a picture in the source you mention (only text).
Can you kindly re-post a picture?
 

[Gerry Webster]

Armin - the forum pages don't seem to be working properly for me so I can't check. If I don't find my pic tomorrow I'll post again.

[Hans J]

here comes help :

http://www.srgc.org.uk/smf/index.php?topic=1208.msg55438#msg55438

[Armin]

Many thanks Hans

[Hans J]

Hi all,

here is a

Sternbergia sicula

grown from seeds collect in Apulia

[Gerry Webster]

Hans - thanks for your help.

This  Italian form of S. sicula is very attractive.

[Gerdk]

Sternbergia identity -

I recently posted (Sept 14th, post no 34) a pic of a plant, given to me by the late Erna & Ronald Frank, which I identified as S. greuteriana. I now think this plant is more likely to be the much rarer S. pulchella from Syria. Those interested might care to look at an account by Erna  of a trip to Syria  with Manfred Koenen  in which they found S. pulchella (in AGS  Bulletin  vol 64 no 4, Dec 1996). Brian Mathew provides an  account of S. pulchella in 'The Garden' vol 118, pt 1 (Jan 1993) & my plant corresponds closely, though not exactly, to his description.

Pasche and Kerndorf stated in ' Die Gattung Sternbergia ' (2002) for Sternbergia pulchella - Flower stalk during flowering invisible, when in fruit prolonging to 1,5 -2 cm

Your plant has a distinct flower stalk which does not exist neither in a photo shown in the account mentioned above nor in the pic of the AGS article. So maybe your plant is something different than S. pulchella.
Sternbergia is a very tricky genus. There are a lot of hybrids between Sternbergia lutea, sicula and greuteriana and a correct determination at least for the smaller forms of these, is very very difficult.

Gerd

[Gerry Webster]

Gerd - thanks for your note. I agree  that the identification of Sternbergias is a problem & I am by no means certain that  my plant is S. pulchella; you may be right, it could be a hybrid. In most respects it conforms to Brian Mathew's description though the  length of stem in my plant does concern me as does the relative length of the style. To my eyes the plant in Erna Frank's  photo appears to have a short stem though it is  difficult to determine from the angle of  the  photo how long it is. The photograph in 'The Garden' (by Brian Mathew) of a plant growing at Kew shows a definite stem, admittedly not as long as on my plants but my plants are growing in rather poor light. Another reason for thinking it might be S. pulchella is that it came from Erna Frank. Unfortunately I lost my original note of its identity(I was obsessed with  frits at the time to the exclusion of everything else) but most of the more unusual Mediterranean plants  grown by the Franks were from their own collections.  It would certainly be very valuable to have an English translation of the Sternbergia text you mention

[Gerdk]

Gerry,
After I posted my remarks concerning the stem I had the feeling that I was a little bit overhasty. If you have a look at some other species of Sternbergia the length could be a variable feature - why not with pulchella? A botanical diagnosis isn't always correct - especially when it was based on a single or few plants (or from 1882 in this case).

Here is an attempt of a translation of the Pasche & Kerndorf article (without personal liability)

Description: Bulb 1-1.5 cm in diameter. Leaves 3-4(6), narrow linear, appearing with the flowers, canaliculate (channelled), keeled, arched downwards, bright green, , with narrow light central stripe, obtuse or slightly pointed, 7-11(15) cm long, 0,5-0,7 cm wide. Margins rough (scabrid?).
Flower stalk during flowering invisible, when in fruit prolonging to 1,5-2 cm. Flowers sessile, yellow; segments narrow linear, circa 1,5 cm long, about as long as the tube (POST 1896).
Filaments of different length. Spathe circa 0,5 cm, silvery with green margin, bifid at the apex. Fruit circa 1,5 cm long, circa 0,5 cm wide, pointed (pointy?). Seeds with elaiosom.

Whew - what a strain for an old brain - I hope this kind of exercise will prevent to develope Alzheimer's disease. 

Gerd