Pleione 2015

[SteveC2]

Sorry Maggi, specifically Pleione that I am interested in.  That's why I posted it in the Pleione section

[Maggi Young]

Oh well, the subject of differences in bulbs and corms of other  plants may be of interest to some readers.

[hud357]

Hello hud357,

yes, I shall be selling again in November. I also put a link to Ian Butterfield's catalogue elsewhere on this website.

It has been a great year for pleione growing, nice and cool but enough light to keep them happy. Mine don't show any interest in going to sleep yet, and there are masses of bulbils.

Growth is slowing down so I am careful with the watering and I am also reducing feed a little. At this time of year I am using diluted tomato food (high potash) to ripen the bulbs. 

I shall keep my eyes open and my mouse moving.

Out of interest ... Is forrestii difficult? I want one but not to see it just deteriorate. My current 'un-named' seem to be doing well but I'm not sure that I'm yet ready to enter the 'species league'.

[hud357]

A couple of questions:

I am interested to know how useful you feel bulb shape / colour is for identification purposes.

Do you feel able to identify many Pleione just by looking at the bulbs?  Obviously the winter flowerers look different, formosana Clare has a distinct pale green colour, and Wharfedale Pine Warbler is almost black, but what about others?

Do all bulbs of a particular hybrid have roughly the same shape?  I would expect named clones to be very similar but what about the bulbs in an unselected mix of any hybrid?

I will explain my reasons for asking if I get any replies!

While there might be common traits of a particular cross, I'm guessing that (not for Pleione in particular, I don't have the experience) there are so many factors that influence growth or flowers that you would never be able to 'stick a pin' in a particular plant.

I say this because I have some plants that, depending upon where I put them in the growing season, are fairly random. Random bulb colour/size, random flower shape/size/colour.

Even with a true species I guess that this is common. Once you get into hybrids ...

[karel_t]

Hi Steve,
There are several species we can recognise only by shape of bulb as P. maculata, praecox, saxicola, humilis, forrestii and albiflora. There is more difficult with limprichtii, pleionoides and bulbocodioides or chunii and aurita or grandiflora and x barbarae, etc. In hybrids is really big mess in bulbs shape and colour, mainly with multi-hybrids.
K.

[SteveC2]

Thanks Karel.  I forgot saxicola which must be just about the most distinctively shaped bulb of all, and humilis with its long neck.

Now I suppose I should explain my question.  Last year I bought three different clones of a certain primary hybrid. All three have grown well, right next to each other in identical compost.  One has produced large flat pale green bulbs.  The other two have made huge elongated bulbs.  Now I appreciate that there will be genetic differences between the different clones but I never expected such a variation and the alarm bells started ringing in my head.  I just wondered if such variation in a hybrid was normal.

I contacted one of the sellers weeks ago and finally recieved an email this afternoon which revealed that the identity of two of my original bulbs was based on a photographic comparison of flower pictures which of course means that it is pretty unreliable.  Can't grumble about such healthy bulbs, especially as I did not pay much for them, and I appreciate the honesty of the seller, but I have put a huge question mark on the labels of two pots.  I just wish people would not try to identify unknown plants such as Pleione from Internet pictures when they are planning to sell them.

[SteveC2]

Hud, just my personal experience, but I find forrestii tricky, and given its relative expense might not recommend it as one to start with.  I have twice got my colonies into double figures and then lost the lot, (still not quite sure why, possibly too wet in the autumn).  If you like the yellow, Shantung Ducat is far more forgiving, vigourous and a better bet, but still expensive.

P.S.  Of course this talk of expense is all relative.  We are not talking albiflora or coronaria here.  I just can't bring myself to shell out Ł90 for a single bulb.  No doubt the mice would home in on it.

[karel_t]

Steve, In primary hybrids are generally very few clones and variability of bulbs is small, or they are uniform regardless clone. In multihybrids is large variability in both the number of clones, and the difference in colour and size of bulbs. Each multihybrid clone may be influenced by any parent in the previous hybridisation line.
K.

[Tim Harberd]

Hi Steve,
   I live in fear of my labelled pots becoming ‘contaminated’! This could happen by a few routes. For instance, occasionally a blackbird, or something, takes a liking to a pot scattering the contents far & wide. Also with some cultivars, the dried leaves of bulbils develop a hook, which makes a bulbils accidental transfer to another pot possible.
   On three occasions, at repotting, I have noticed a seriously odd bulb, when compared to its supposed sisters These have been re-planted separately. On only one occasion was the rogue bulb not true to type.
   So my experience would be that even mono clonal selections of pleione, whilst in general having a family resemblance, can be strikingly different in bulb form.

   I guess that’s no help at all!!

Tim DH

[SteveC2]

Very helpful actually Tim, and thanks for the answer.  It had never crossed my mind about "contamination" by blackbirds but I think you have just answered my question as to how a Shantung Ducat turned up in with my Tongariros.
When the bulbs are outside I often find bulbs that have been pulled right out of the pots even quite well into the season.  The ones in the greenhouse seem less attractive than the Disas,  I gave away loads of those last year as I had no idea which variety they were after the birds had finished.

[hud357]

Which brings me to ask some questions directed at those with far more experience ...

Is there a 'fast track' evolution path that would have had Darwin scribbling furiously were he around today?

The reason I ask is that I was trying to get some (growing) information on Cattleya x Silvana. I have to admit to getting really confused. Supposedly a hybrid, it seems that it has its own niche in nature and comes true from seed (fast track evolution?). Traits I would consider the very definition of a species.

I know from my own seed raising experience that a batch can throw up distant ancestors. I'm not going to name the species for fear of starting an 'internet war'. But here goes ... A long time ago I obtained seed (named location and species) from a supplier with a reputation second to none. One of the seedlings (which I still have) is certainly a hybrid. Great, great grandparent re-appearing in the line? My point here is that the whole 'line' is 'contaminated'. Everyone exchanging plants from this particular line are exchanging something else. Not a species, a hybrid. However distant.

I do wonder just how many 'species' are traded, in good faith, that are actually hybrids (however distant). Perhaps the 'contamination' is often of natural origin and no Blackbirds were involved.

 

[Maren]

Hi Tim,

What you say is so true. Bulbil hooks also attach themselves to the fur of mice as they scamper along or over the pots. Years later an alien bulb comes up in a labelled pot or tray. That's why it is always safest to buy flower sized bulbs in the hope that their 'mothers' have already flowered once and been identified.

[hud357]

Hud, just my personal experience, but I find forrestii tricky, and given its relative expense might not recommend it as one to start with.  I have twice got my colonies into double figures and then lost the lot, (still not quite sure why, possibly too wet in the autumn).  If you like the yellow, Shantung Ducat is far more forgiving, vigourous and a better bet, but still expensive.

P.S.  Of course this talk of expense is all relative.  We are not talking albiflora or coronaria here.  I just can't bring myself to shell out Ł90 for a single bulb.  No doubt the mice would home in on it.

OK - I will stick with hybrids for now. My default position with all new 'lines'.

As to expense - I was recently looking at a 'snowdrop' at Ł250/bulb when my jaw hit the desk. This isn't to suggest that growers or breeders wouldn't recognise the value but me, as a casual observer, well ...
 

[Tim Harberd]

Hi Hud,
   The classic example of what you refer to is P. x confusa… so called because it was passed round as P. forrestii for half a century! A problem which continues into the second generation with some people not sure if their P. x confusa is actually a P. Shantung ‘Ducat’!!
   Apart from that… you also seem to be referring to ‘hybrid swarms’. A more common problem with Dactylorhiza, where it can be very hard to draw lines between the various species. Although half a dozen natural hybrids of Pleione are recognized, I’ve not heard them being described as ‘hybrid swarms’.

Tim DH

[vigor]

the real pleione praecox season is coming