Daffodils in the Southern Hemisphere - 2007

[annew]

Cripes! gaditanus has tiny flowers to start with!

[Mini-daffs]

 
Hi
Lesley, I have recently received seed of N. gaditanus but I am yet to flower it. N. gaditanus is the smallest of the jonquil species so if you have a minute form it has got to be the smallest of the small. Bit like our N. assoanus ssp. minutus I suspect but even smaller. There are miniature forms of quite a few species. We have miniature forms of some of the tazetta species. We also have a dwarf form of N. nevadensis. There is a bit of controversy over our dwarf floriferous form of N. calcicola but it has far too many flowers to be N. scaberulus and is larger than N. scaberulus. We try and collect as many forms of species as we can. We do it all by seed because of the quarantine restrictions. We have a wish list and N. gaditanus is still on it.
Make sure you pollinate it if it flowers for you as it is almost certainly rare and hard to obtain unless you know the right person. At this point I have to admit that I am green with envy (something about the compulsive collector coming out here). Keep the seed and I will swap you for another rare species!

[Lesley Cox]

When it flowers I shall certainly cross pollinate the two seedlings and if there's any seed, you shall have it. Of course I don't know the original source as it was from NZAGS about 3 years ago. There were only the two seeds so I suppose I'm lucky they both came up.

[Mini-daffs]

 
Hi
A brief diversion. Someone asked about daffodils for the garden. We have a few clumps in our 'umble garden in suburban Canberra so I will show you some. I will also show you a few of our camellias. Some are quite tall and they have lots of huge flowers on them at this time of the year. We are so busy with our daffodils that we don't show our camellias. However, our garden is on the local walking trail at this time of the year.
I am not sure you would want to go out and buy enough bulbs to establish a clump the size of ours. I think I twin scaled some of these a long time ago.

[Mini-daffs]

 
A few more photos of our garden daffodils for you. Close-ups this time. Lesley do not go any further as this post will contain a photo of a split cup daffodil!
Lovely clumps of these will certainly attract plenty of attention but I don't think it would be a cheap option!!

[Mini-daffs]

 
Ok enough of the boring photos of our garden. (Had someone indicated that our garden was mildly interesting I might have posted a few more photos but...) So a few more daffodil photos. The triandus hybrid with 5 florets is another hybridising success. So is the 7Y-Y miniature with superb petal coverage.

[Mini-daffs]

 
Hi
A few more photos.

[Maggi Young]

Didn't give us too much time to comment on your garden, did you, Graham?

[Mini-daffs]

 
Hi
Maggie, I did say it was a brief diversion!!
I will divert for one more photo but it is not of our garden but of Trillium rivale that is liking the new shade house. Unfortunately the pot has some feral N. cyclamineus in it--I need to get them out of the pot.

[Joakim B]

Thanks Graham and Paul for the info about the camelias.
Is camelia of the retic type more frost hardy?
I am impressed with the size of the flowers that is so hard to tell from a picture.
Regarding the size of the camelias they will be big with time my father-in-law has some lovly camelia trees that are really big with very nice flowers but "only 6-9 cm" across.
Graham I had to work yesterday so I could not comment on Your lovely garden picture.
That is really nice tosee them in their "right environment" as I think of them. not to say that they do not belong in a show just that it is so great to see them in a garden. Maybe it is too great

Just a question about the poeticus "champion" what made it champion? Size of flower slight tint of pink or yellow in the white or what. I can only see these things when shown by a master. I like poeticus and we have a lot in Hungary but I am not traind to see what mkes a good narcissus. 
Thanks again for teaching me and all the others as well as showing these hard core pics. 

Joakim

[Paul T]

Nice, Graham.  I particularly like the obesus clone (just perfect form to it, isn't it?) and the assoanus ssp minutus.  I like a number of others, but I'm not going to bore people with the whole list! 

OK, decided I must also comment on the triandrus and the two florets to a stem.  Very nice!!

[Joakim B]

here are the pics of the camelia
They are called "cameleira" in most part of Portugal but some places call them "japoniera" of the latter name.
This pics do not show well how big the trees are. It is four of them but I only show one. They have a mix of pink and withe flowers as well as pink-and-white flowers if You know what I meen.
These are from March so most of the flowers were gone.
Joakim

[Mini-daffs]

 
Got to run--lots of hybridising to do with pollen from the Show flowers. Got to try and develop some miniature split cups for Lesley!! What I do need to do is work on breeding some tiny Division 2 and 3 hybrids since I am somewhat bereft of these.
I will reply to some of the questions this evening in all probability. Might even post some more garden photo diversions if there is any interest!!
Joakim does that mean you have days off?? No such luxury here. Day job then daffodils! But it is rewarding when you see [lots of] good seedlings flower for the first time.
I have to find where the ducks are nesting so I don't mow any eggs!! Might have some ducklings soon I suspect. Lots of activity with the birds of late but then it is spring!! [Better watch it or this posting will get X rated with all this talk of breeding!!

[Lesley Cox]

Tell me about the giant N. bulbocodium please Graham. I have one which I thought was a seedling from N. b. obesus but surely can't be. It has a very large bright golden cup and grows to 35cms high, almost too big for the rock garden but a great clump, very showy. My "ordinary" obesus has a fatter, wider cup of the same colour but stems of only 3-4 cms on almost prostrate, snaky foliage. The big one flowers right through the winter but obesus is still a couple of weeks away.

And please, don't feel a need to develop split cups on my account. 

[Mini-daffs]

 
Hi
Joakim, reticulata hybrids appear to survive drought, heat and severe cold better than japonica hybrids but there are some extremely hardy japonica cultivars as well. Reticulatas come from Yunnan province in China where it is pretty cold in winter and pretty hot in summer. some of the modern cultivars of both reticulata hybrids and japonica hybrids are very beautiful. They would all grow well for you in Portugal. The largest japonica hybrids, such as Guilio Nuccio, are about the same size as a very large reticulata hybrid flower. They are about the size of a dinner plate when well grown. But like all plants they come in all shapes and sizes. Not sure but we would have about 40 or 50 in our suburban garden.
In relation to what is or is not a good show flower, I could drive you mad about good form being a flower that has nice overlapping perianth, crystalline white perianth, clear yellow and red cup that is perfectly circular etc. but if you are not going to exhibit buy and grow what looks appealing to you. Women daffodil growers have a preference for white, white-pinks and reverse bicolors while male growers prefer yellows and yellow-reds that are strong and bold.
Our garden has white-pink doubles and other white-pinks because it is a moist garden compared to the farm . Some American and British bred daffodils prefer the conditions on offer in our home garden.
We get a lot of species seed and occasionally you get something good. Only two bulbs survived and one is a giant one at around 5cm in diameter and a stem that is very thick and strong. We have quite a few giant seedlings of our own breeding but getting big stems is an issue. A lot of them would benefit from stronger stems.
There is a lot of variability in the height and size of species daffodils. We have miniature, intermediate and giant forms of N. triandus triandus. There is a giant form of N. b. citrinus. We have seed of it but I don't know how it is going. I need to get some more and put it into the shadehouse as I think it likes it damp. And that is the other thing--if the particular bulb is from a wet area then it may well be a much bigger form than one from a rocky outcrop in the mountains. Are you sure about 35cm? I only ask because that makes it bigger than a lot of our standards. But then again we are not very good at breeding standards. If it flowers over winter then it may just be an early flowering form. Equally it could be a form of bulbocodium conspicuus but it is not usually a giant.