South African Bulbs2012

[arillady]

Arnold if you get seed I would love to try it too please. It is such a brighter flower than crispa. Roland can you receive corms ok in the mail from Oz? I will send you a couple if it can be done.
Mine here get a good old baking each summer but where I found the bulbs originally was on a roadside near an old property under some gum trees - around the base of one. It was a bit sandier there too than here.

[bulborum]

Hi Pat

We can receive everything here in France
as long as it is send by normal post (not express post , Cost $600,00 for a broker)
just mention on the CN22 (post office or google CN22 and print the small paper ,Or I can mail you the PDF) Gift and Botanical sample
with a very small value
Not sure for how long
But as long as it works I am happy
Germany seems bad in the moment

Roland

[arillady]

The form is usual practice. I will try to do it this week.

[bulborum]

Thanks Pat

[ArnoldT]

Just checking email before the EPL goes on.  My internet connection to the forum is always best in morning

I put my SA bulbs in a cool basement over summer. Water once per week and a Hydroponic fertilizer which I've mentioned here before.  Greenhouse at not less than 45 F during winter.

[ArnoldT]

Pat:

If seeds comes you're on the list as well.

[bulborum]

So probably the Dutch clone is the problem
many Dutch bulbs are clones
multiplied by thousands or even millions
that's why I prefer Wild collected or well known sources for seeds or bulbs

Roland

[Angelo Porcelli]

Roland, maybe my experience is of a little value, but my Ferraria crispa flower profusely and grow like weeds here. They have a pretty invasive habit, setting lots of seeds and multiplying  by corms, which I believe are stoloniferous as I find new plants everywhere. I raised them from Silverhill seeds and got an incredible array of patterns and colour combinations, but for lazyness I have never tried to isolate them, I guess I have 7 different forms.

Speaking of SA irids, the Moraea polystachya is a plant which should never miss in any Mediterranean garden, it will flowers for months without any care. Photo of 30th Dec

[Tony Willis]

Veltheimia bracteata lemon flame , not easy to stop it going a bit leggy on a windowsill with very little daylight at this time of year

[PeterT]

I have been trying to grow Ferraria for ten years. For years I kept them dry, but a few years ago I waterd and fed them a lot -and planted them at the bottom of deep pots.
Then they grew very well  for one year! Then... cold winters! (minus 15 /minus 18). I think that they are hardy to no colder than minus 10 c.
One tiny corm survived from perhaps 8 pots. I have some more now, one tried to flower last Summer. It grew and grew for months but never got far enough to open its flowers -and snails kept trying to eat it. Last summer was cold here.

 I think that the key with Ferraria is to make the corms grow strongly enough for flowering sized shoots and heat for the buds to develop.

They are stoloniferous Angelo!

 As I understand the structure of corms (versus bulbs) the flower bud is made in the growing shoot - not in the dormant corm. if anyone else knows more about this I am happy to be corrected -I do not claim to be a botanist.

[Darren]

You are correct Peter - the cormous Irids develop their flower buds during the current season and not during dormancy - which is why it is apparently possible to flower some the first season from seed. As you say - it is getting them to put on good growth during the season that is key. Cold summers may cause them to take a year off and miss a season completely but if they do grow then they should hopefully flower if big/vigorous enough

One of my F crispa came from Monocot Nursery 12 years ago and grows/flowers every year even in poor weather so I'm sure clonal differences are important.  Those Ferraria I've raised from seed have been painfully slow in my conditions and my seedlings of F. divaricata are still tiny and awaiting their first flowers after 10 years.

[PeterT]

You are correct Peter - the cormous Irids develop their flower buds during the current season and not during dormancy - which is why it is apparently possible to flower some the first season from seed. As you say - it is getting them to put on good growth during the season that is key. Cold summers may cause them to take a year off and miss a season completely but if they do grow then they should hopefully flower if big/vigorous enough

Thank you for this Darren,
at last someone else who realises the differences between bulbs and corms and the practical implications which mean that it is important horticulturally as well as botanically.
So many who appear well informed seem to equate the stems in corms with the basal plates in bulbs. Where I have pointed out these differences on another forum the eminent botanist's either keep quiet or give ambiguous information which suggests that they don't even know what cells make up each part of a corms structure.

[bulborum]

Peter

I think this is the same problem as Amaryllis (Hippeastrum) and Geranium (Pelargonium)
the names are so popular used
that you easy make the mistake to use them wrong
special because both names Amaryllis and Geranium exist

Roland

[PeterT]

Though not tackling the subject of bulbs versus corms I have put together a 'montage' of conversation from public forums, not in strict chronological order, of the confusion which seems to be perpetuated. Most of the names may be  recognisable to plant enthusiasts. Please do not bother with reading it all if plant anatomy does not interest you.

Musa corms
Tim Chapman (Sun, 03 Jun 2012 22:11:24 PDT)
Again it all boils down to limiting definitions and diversity. Given the definitions available and the history of use most Musa have corms, some have rhizomes. Now clearly a Musa corm does not fit into the definition you refer to in regards to depletion of and reforming a new corm etc. My main point is that in Musa taxonomy a distinction is made between the two.

@ Waddick, the foremost authority on and taxonomist of Musa refers to corms in his literature. The use of the term is valid.

Musa corms
Peter Taggart (Mon, 04 Jun 2012 05:17:17 PDT)

Please, could there be some clarification here?
Peter (UK)

Musaceae
James Waddick (Sun, 03 Jun 2012 20:26:17 PDT)

Dear Friends,
All members of the family Musaceae and the related
Zingiberales have rhizomes. Although somewhat modified in bananas, it
is very obvious in Cannas, Gingers, Heliconias and other relatives.

Just the way it is. Best Jim W.

Hannon (Sun, 03 Jun 2012 17:59:04 PDT)

Peter,

The term "corm" is inconsistently defined by various sources, including a
number of botanical dictionaries. The better definition, in my view, is one
that can be usefully confined to bulb-like stems comprised of several nodes
and internodes that are *completely exhausted and renewed each season*.
Examples include Crocus, Gladiolus, Amorphophallus (not quite all), and...


I wonder if Hannon has ever dug up a crocosmia corm? 

Musa corms
Tim Chapman (Sun, 03 Jun 2012 20:18:34 PDT)

Aside from size and notable pseudostem, why can't Musa be considered
rhizomatous?

Dylan

Some are. Musa taxonomists consider some to have corms, other species to have rhizomes. If you were to dig up a rhizomatous species (for example M laterita ) you find something something similar to a Canna rhizome (on steroids). Ie plants attached to a network of rhizomes that are growing horizontally continuously. In M laterita the rhizome can grow a meter before throwing up a new sprout. These rhizomes will usually survive a dormancy or two at least and can sprout new growth along the the rhizome (not just at the end of the growing point..if that makes sense).

On the other hand species with corms will spout new plants but there is no connecting stem/rhizome per se. The two corms will eventually separate. The difference is noticeable above ground as well as the rhizomatous plants are clearly runners that can quickly colonize a large area. Those with corms have a more clumping habit.

Don't know if it holds true for all Musa, but it seems that rhizome vs corm fits with naturally deciduous vs evergreen. There might be exceptions?

Musa corms
Hannon (Sun, 03 Jun 2012 20:45:57 PDT)

Tim,

I know Musa is diverse and don't doubt that that diversity extends to
rootstocks. Perhaps it is a case similar to Amorphophallus, but reversed:
almost all amorphos grow from a more or less globular or discoid structure
that is typically used up completely each season and is "replaced" by a new
corm formed at (and by) the base of the current season's leaf and
cataphylls. However, there is at least one species, A. coaetaneus, that
could be described as forming a "chain of corms". Instead of being used up
entirely in a season, the corms persist in rhizomatous fashion for several....

Peter Boyce phymatarum@googlemail.com via science.uu.nl
   
4/24/12
      
to Arisaema

No, because it has no ‘tunic’. Think Crocus and Gladiolus for true corms.

 

Geophytic aroids with underground storage organs are never cormous. Most, regardless of the shape of the storage organ, are tubers. Rhizome has a very specific morphological application and there are none in Arisaema that I recall. Amorphophallus has two definite rhizomatous species, A. rhizomatosus and A. hayi.

In my opinion Peter Boyce could have included more on the internal structure of corms in this last answer....
Yes Roland, common and erronious usage of these words is wide spread even among those who should know  much better. I too  slip up but I try to be carefull on this.

At work, as a gardener, I have to be extremely careful to ensure I
understand correctly what my clients want when they refer to "Geraniums",
"Automn Crocus", "Greater Celandine" and so on.
Peter (UK)

[Ian]

The end of the flowering period for the winter growers here, at least unless my very few amaryllids decide to pop up flowers in mid summer.

There's a tale with these two pictures.

Our AGS group used to have a display at the Holker Hall festival in Cumbria each June. Back in the late 90s one of the donated display plants was labelled 'Moraea alpina'. I was rather taken with it so when I saw seed in the AGS exchange a few years later I got some. All I knew about M. alpina was that it was a summer growing Drakensberg species so I treated my (many) seedlings accordingly. By the time I observed that the seedlings really wanted to grow in winter I had lost most of them and realised it could not be M. alpina. A switch to a winter growing regime produced much improved growth in the only surviving plant, which then flowered. I have identified it as Moraea debilis. In fact the pot I originally saw at Holker was also M. debilis misidentified and I wonder if the donor of this plant also sent the seed to the exchange.

M.debilis is related to M tripetala but is usually smaller flowered and (distinctively) flowers at the very end of its growth period as the leaves die off, M tripetala flowers much earlier - usually March with me. M debilis seems to be rather rare in cultivation. M alpina coincidentally flowers at the same time but is at the start of its growth period. I googled for images of M. alpina and found M. debilis is masquerading as it elsewhere too!

As luck would have it I mentioned this story to a kind forumist at an SRGC discussion weekend and he soon sent me a few corms of the true M. alpina which is a delightful plant only 4cm high in flower.

Hi Darren,
According to your description, does moraea alpina start growing in March?
I got several bulbils of m. Alpina this year, and i plant them in October like many other South African bulbs. I thought they were dead because i see no leaf coming out.