Zdeněk Zvolánek -Edraianthus Session

[mark smyth]

Dont you feed your slugs, Darren?

I've been to ZZ's garden 3 or 4 times and love it every time. Later I'll show some of my Edraianthus

[David Nicholson]

Whilst Googling and reading more about Edraianthus I came across this paper and thought it might be useful to add a Link to this thread. The paper is far and above my understanding but might be useful to someone.

http://www.utm.utoronto.ca/~w3bio/faculty_and_research/stefanovic_papers/Taxon_2008.pdf
edit to add new link :http://curis.ku.dk/ws/files/9539722/Taxon.2008.pdf

[Thomas Huber]

Wow, David - this paper must have taken years of botanical research for the authors.
They might forgive me, but Zdenek's photos and words do help me much more  
And again the old phrase "A photo says more than thousand words" has been confirmed!

[Stone Rider]

I bow in silent admiration for so much knowledge on this wondeful genus Zdenek ! 
Thanks so much for sharing it and obviously a big thanks to your secretary as well !! 

By the way, the pictures are stunning !! 

Thank you, Luc.
 I admire that strong woman and I love to work with
 her; the only nasty point spoiling my full adoration is the fact that
 Maggi was famous trade mark name for the strongest souce extract during
 my innocent youth in the central Europe.

[Luc Gilgemyn]

    yes... Maggi was/is quite spicey....   

[Lesley Cox]

And she can be very saucy too!

[Maggi Young]

I see that ZZ, the Stone Rider, is one of the Guest Speakers at the NARGS event to be held in Colorado in July 2010.... see here :

http://www.srgc.org.uk/smf/index.php?topic=2410.msg124432#msg124432

[krisderaeymaeker]

ZZ inspired me to look at my own pictures (from last summer)
So here they are ........It is pumilio and dinaricus .
They are growing very well on my tufa-rocks and even on tufa they behave a bit like weed.
On the tufa-rocks the seedlings appear in the environment of the parents.......
I hope you enjoy ........
Other species I grow : serphyllifolius,horvathii ,wettsteinii,australis,montenegrinus ,graminifolius and few others that I forget at this moment.

[Lesley Cox]

Those are very lovely Kris.

[Katherine J]

Thank You very much Zdenek and Maggi for this wonderful thread!
I have a question, please:

Three of them are false: Edraianthus owerinianus= Muehlbergella oweriniana (small narrow flowers and column-like stems), E. parnassicus = Halascyella parnassica and E. calamithifolius = Petkovia orphanidea (syn. Campanula orphanidea).

do You mean that they are called no more Edraianthus? It interests me because I have E. owerinianus and E. parnassicus. In Graham Nicholls' Dwarf Campanulas I found nothing about this...

[Maggi Young]

Kata, as far  as I know, although those plants have often been called Edraianthus, their "other" names are the older ones under which they were described. I hope ZZ will be able to tell us more.

[Lesley Cox]

And where, in all this, is Wahlenbergia? What plants still live with that name?

[Mick McLoughlin]

I have this from seed exchange as Wahlenbergia mathewsii.

[Stone Rider]

Punishment for pretending to be an expert 

  There is interesting small plant in Parnassos Mts. in Greece (and some other mountains). It has branched main stem and wide spatulate leaves with crenulate-serrulate margins. It was described in 1846 as Campanula parnassica, renamed as Edraianthus parnassicus in 1894. The last botanical name is Halacsyella parnassica and by the last analysis of DNA this species is closer to campanulas. What is in cultivation I do not know, but probably some another Edraianthus is sold and exchanged in the name of this really distinct Greek plant.
   Edraianthuses described from area of Northern Caucasus, which are morphologically closer to complex of Campanula tridentata were renamed to  genus Muehlbergella. Graham Nicholls made big mistake and described plant running under false name, which was actually Edraianthus pumilio, the plant from Biokovo Mts. with silver leaves.

[Kovacs Pal]

I have some Edraianthus in my garden too (in Hungary). According to my experience the larger ones (E. tenuifolia, serbicus, dalmaticus, graminifolius) you can keep easily for years and they bring seeds usually. Unfortunately the lower and nicer ones (E. pumilio, serpyllifolius) live only for two or three years. They can bring seeds only rarely.

I have a lot of slugs too, but they don’t eat the older plants.