Allium 2010

[TheOnionMan]

I have looked at my two plants of A. 'Ozawa'. I'm afraid I only keep detailed records of my narcissus and galanthus acquisitions, so unfortunately don't have the source of these, but it is likely to be Lamberton, Edrom or Pottertons nurseries.
The photos below show one plant on the left and the other on the right with their leaves then their flower stems. I'm still confused. The leaves of both are about 1mm across, both hollow, but at least the dark-flowered plant has distinctly angled leaves.

Anne, flower stems are typically solid on all these related species, but based on your photo showing fistulose leaves, and based on the key on the previous page, it can either be a few-flowered short form of A. thunbergii, or A. virgunculae var. yakushimense, both have fistulose leaves.  However the leaf dimension of 1mm across, points squarely at an A. vigunculae form, as thunbergii has wider leaves greater than 1 mm.  Now, If I could get the 2009 taxonomic revision of the A. virgunculae complex, where yet another 2 varieties of A. virgunculae are defined, there might even be more possibilities.  Thanks for the detail photos of stem and leaf diagnostics, they are most helpful.  So many look-alike "species" and varieties in these confusing Japanese autumn-blooming alliums.  But rejoice in each and every one, they are so welcome to flower so late in the season.

[annew]

They certainly are, and that was the reason I bought them. I'll leave the original labels on for now!

[David Nicholson]

Allium virgunculae (I think?) pictured at our AGS Local Group meeting last night and grown by Edwina Pickard.

[TheOnionMan]

That's a cute lil' onion David, looks like the real A. virgunculae.  Here's a link on a Japanese site, looks just like that plant.
http://hanamist.sakura.ne.jp/flower/tansiyo/yuri/itorakkyo.html

[David Nicholson]

Many thanks Mark I'll pass that on to the grower. I'm hopeful of scrounging a bulb

[Lvandelft]

The flowers on this plant look rather different from my plant.

[TheOnionMan]

The flowers on this plant look rather different from my plant.

Don't forget, there are 4 varieties of A. virgunculae.  At one point I grew about 10-12 different forms of A. virgunculae, several imported directly from Japan; a couple from known locales, all were rather different, but all were small thready-leafy species that flowered in autumn. Some had the rather open shallow bell-shaped florets seen in the photo David showed, others had the more typical campanulate floret shape. And then there are other recently described species very closely allied to both virgunculae and thunbergii, namely austrokyushinense and pseudojaponicum, all being small autumn-flowering Japanese onions with pink to purple flowers with long exserted stamens separated on rather finite differences, see: http://www.srgc.org.uk/smf/index.php?topic=5766.msg170443#msg170443

I'm trying to apply a name to the flat-leaved A. thunbergii I received years ago from the US National Arboretum, it is still in flower now, and setting see (see photos).  It might be A. pseudojaponicum, however I have a problem with the small key to the species in the link above; according to that key, A. thunbergii has inner filaments with teeth on either side, whereas in my experience the teeth are often lacking, in fact the Flora of China reports "inner ones (filaments) sometimes with 1 very small tooth on each side", which indicates to me that depending on whether filaments have teeth or not is an unreliable characteristic.

What one is able to do, is to place subject fall-blooming Japanese Alliums into one "camp" or another, is it closer to virgunculae (dwarf, thready-leaf, few-flowered species), or closer to thunbergii (taller plants, denser flower heads, broader trigonous hollow leaves).  In the case of thunbergii 'Ozawa' it is a bit more academic, the true cultivar has certain characteristics as I've shown earlier, closely aligned to thunbergii with wider strongly trigonous hollow leaves and fuller heads of rosy purple flowers.

[bulborum]

Just back after all the shows

Allium chamaemoly is in flower and in fruit
the first picture is in Sicily LN
the two other at the nursery

Roland

[TheOnionMan]

Hey Allium fans, I received an announcement today from Dr. Reinhard Fritsch that "some data and images of definitively determined accessions of our IPK Taxonomic Allium reference collection are now available via IPK Homepage (Institute of Plant Genetics in Gatersleben, Germany).  Keep this first link handy, because if you choose to look at any other database link, you can't get back to this home page.
http://www.ipk-gatersleben.de/Internet/Infrastruktur/Datenbanken/GenetischeRessourcen

I've been checking it out, and there is excellent information and photos available, showing many species that are otherwise difficult or impossible to find photos of.  The typus information, indicating where each accession was made, is also most useful.  There is much that can be accessed here, although some of the web linking and functionality can be tricky to figure out, but let me highlight the most useful items I've found so far.

Taxonomic Allium Reference Collection - currently 3784 records of Allium accessions, many with photographs.  Some steps on how best to use the resource:

a.  Go to: http://apex.ipk-gatersleben.de/apex/f?p=265:1:0:::::
(link updated 08-21-2015, their database location moved)
b.  Click on "Search allium data" at the top of the page, a huge list will appear.

1.  Since the list is not sorted alphabetically, use the drop-down list labeled - Select scientific name -  (photo 1)

2.  I selected Allium akaka, a list of 4 accessions shows.  Click on the left-hand document icon to display the first record.  (photo 2)

3.  The first record is displayed, if there are photos, thumbnail images show in the record. Use the left and right arrows in the record
     to cycle through the records, finding photos you want to look at.   (photo 3)

4.  Cycling through the records, it is interesting to see from the thumbnails the variations in the species.  (photo 4)

5.  From the drop-down list I moved on to Allium eriocoleum, a beautiful (and rare) yellow-flowered species.  (photo 5)

6.  Click on a thumbnail for an enlarged view, here showing Allium eriocoleum.  (photo 6)

There is also a List of Allium images from the Allium Database (this is separate from the photos available through the Taxonomic Allium Ref Collection)
http://mansfeld.ipk-gatersleben.de/pls/htmldb_pgrc/f?p=185:83:4399216669677684

Have fun

[Kristl Walek]

Mark....thank you so much for this....have spent some time this morning playing with this---and already found a few answers I had been searching for.

 

Kristl

[TheOnionMan]

Mark....thank you so much for this....have spent some time this morning playing with this---and already found a few answers I had been searching for.

Glad you find it useful, it's great when a resource gets used right away.

[TheOnionMan]

On a separate topic I posted information about Aksu Inn - Excursions to South Kazakhstan:
http://www.srgc.org.uk/smf/index.php?topic=6262.msg173185#msg173185
Yevgeny Belousov kindly gave permission to show some of the beautiful Allium species from Kazakhstan, more of his beautiful high-resolution photos are available for purchase on a CD, see the link above.

1     Allium carolinianum - Ulken Kaindy Pass, Kazakhstan

2     A. eriocoleum - a beautiful yellow species, allied to the more widespread (and also yellow) A. scabriscapum.

3     A. karataviense - a familiar spacies, but oh so variable in the wide, this is a very pretty form

4-5  A. fedtschenkoanum (A. atrosanguineum var. fedtschenkoanum per the Flora of China), one I have lusted over for years, think of it as a golden orange form of chives (A. schoenoprasum) to which it is related.  Isn't that field of bloom amazing

[Maggi Young]

 The field of A. fedtschenkoanum is amazing, yes. Locally plentiful is the phrase, I suppose! Very fetching colours.

[TheOnionMan]

Hello onion mavens, here is an intriguing little onion photographed by Panayoti Kelaidis on is 2009 expedition to Mongolia, sadly this one was not among the collections made.  I'm parsing through the 1995 publication in Feddes Repertorium 106 (1995) 1-2, pp 59-81, The Genus Allium L. in the Flora of Mongolia by Nicolai Friesen, to see if I can match up an ID.  Since this short publication is basically an enumeration of species and their distribution, I'll have to resort to species descriptions elsewhere, such as Flora of the USSR, and possibly Flora of China, depending on where in Mongolia the photo was taken.  A really cute onion, whatever it is.

[Stephenb]

I visited a friend who showed me two unidentified Alliums picked up in a market in Aizawl, Mizaram in India

1-4 is a very large species - the leaves are serrated
5-6 is small but quite large bulbs (reminiscent of Rakkyo or Allium chinense)

I asked Dr. Reinhard Fritsch of Gatersleben about the Allium found in a vegetable market in India (link above) and he feels pretty sure it is Allium hookeri (also youir initial feeling Mark).  

He also told me that a preliminary version of a database presenting Gatersleben's taxonomic Allium collection is now available via the Internet:
http://www.ipk-gatersleben.de/databases/allium

Here you can see pictures of e.g. A. hookeri amongst many others. This will I think be a valuable resource!  However, he said that he did not know how long this link will work because the database will soon be linked via the IPK homepage.