Vices, Daphnes and hybrid Lewisias....how's that for a thread?

[Lesley Cox]

Your hybrids are just fantastic, especially the yellow rediviva hybs. However did you achieve those?

Lesley, with great difficulty and a lot of time and patience.

Well, I guess that's to be expected. Anything worth achieving takes time, patience and yes, difficulty too. So congratulations Michael on some wonderful results. Long may you continue with this work. 

Thank you David. The meeting is actually on Tuesday. (I'ts already Monday here remember.)  I will be "officially" able to retire in two weeks (went to see pension office this morning, about largesse to come. $202 per week, about 80 GB pounds at current exchange. Not a fortune but very nice all the same). I do want to go on working for maybe 3 or 4 years though if possible. One thing, it's illegal here to fire someone because of their age and many people, especially men, choose to go on well into their 70s. Something on the telly the other day about an 85 year old still working on a factory floor job, 40 hr week and doing it well.

Tony, wish your Lesley well please, from this Lesley. I like the term intellectual pygmies. I'll take that with me tomorrow and while I won't SAY it, they'll wonder why I'm smiling to myself all through the meeting.

[Maggi Young]

Anyone who is interested in Lewisia and been enjoying Micheael's truly stunning hybrids will get a real treat  when this week's Wisley Log appears online.........I have had a sneak preview!
Edit: I see it is already online.... Fast Fred is getting faster!http://www.srgc.org.uk/wisley/2008/280208/log.html


Michael told us how he had sent his remaining stock of his superb hybrids to Ian Christie.... as it happened, I was at Kirriemuir this past Monday, so guess what I was asking about? Ian showed me the plants from Michael... lovely healthy creatures, looking good even without flowers... and some were already coming into flower in cold Kirrie!  President Ian has been too busy of late ( as anyone who has even half an inkling to his schedule will assert) to be able to spend time propagating these plants so there were just the stock plants... I told Ian I would be very keen to get young plants from these strains of Michael when he next had time to make cuttings. Fair enough, says the Pres. but I don't know when that might be... let's take a few now, though you won't know what the colours are, and you can put the roots on them yourself. So now I have a fine assortment of Irish Lewisia cuttings, which I hope will soon make roots and begin to enjoy life in Aberdeen.

[hadacekf]

Michael,
Your collection of Lewisia is unique. I like it this beautiful plants very much and I cultivate it too.   

[David Nicholson]

Maggi, if you get to the point where you have offsets to spare I could offer them a really good home There could be lots of cake and chocolate in it

[Maggi Young]

David, I would very much hope to reach that stage but I am not in the business of taking food from the mouths of the Christie family so perhaps by then Ian will have time to propagate them and have lots available for all! 

[Lesley Cox]

[quote  So now I have a fine assortment of Irish Lewisia cuttings, which I hope will soon make roots and begin to enjoy life in Aberdeen.
[/quote]

What a lucky lady you are, Maggi.

[gote]

I was growing Lewisias in the mid - Swedish climate many years ago and I hope that I will get going again. Of course I never came near Michael's achievements but I had nearly two hundred redivivas when the mice had them all. That somehow stumped my ardour.
Anyway, this is what I did.
I filled a frame on the slope with a mixture of 1 part well rotted cow manure, two sifted sphagnum peat, three coarse sand and four granular loam from a field. I believe I added some bonemeal too. The top layer was 5-10mm of coarse grit but that was for looks. I did not find it necessary.
The glass came off in the spring and came back on when they died back in the summer. There was no bottom in the frame, it rested on my normal sandy soil. The moisture from below was sufficient to start them in the fall.
I think that this level of manure would be called feeding them well and all kinds I grew flowered very satisfactory.
Michael says do not feed - I say feed but we are using different feeds, different ingredients in the compost, have different climate and different size of "receptacle".

Michael would you care to comment?

Göte     

[Luc Gilgemyn]

Wonderful view Göte - if it weren't for that wooden sleeper, your pic could have been taken in the Beartooth range in the Rockies ! 

[gote]

Thank you Luc.
Somehow I think that a wooden frame does not look more unnatural as habitat for Lewisia than a stone through - not to talk about a plastic pot. 
Swearing in the church am I ?? 
Göte

[Michael J Campbell]

Michael says do not feed - I say feed but we are using different feeds,

Gote, I said do not overfeed Rediviva, meaning that you will get lots of foliage and no flowers. I did feed occasionally( plants in pots) with a seaweed tomato fertilizer when I thought that the feed in the compost was all used up. The hybs are greedy feeders.
I do not feed any of the Lewisias planted out in the scree bed as I like to grow them hard so they stand up to the weather better.
I live in a very wet climate.

[mark smyth]

I just found this thread

Michael those are stunning Lewisias. Will the yellow grow outside?

[Maggi Young]

MARK! Read the thread properly... Michael  has told us several times that the whole point is that he bred them to grow outside!!  TSK!

[Michael J Campbell]

Yes Mark, they will all grow outside.

Did you click on the link below this message and see them all ?

[mark smyth]

I think I saw many of them at Termonfeckon? I'll look again now.

Maggi I had to look at 4 pages quickly to catch up!

[Paul T]

Just catching up with this thread...... Michael those Lewisias are absolutely SPECTACULAR!!!!  Wow!!!!!  That's some fantastic results from your breeding... well done.  I don't have a single one here as yet, but I do have some seed to sow very soon so here's hoping I will have some younguns next spring.