In Gatlinburg, we found the forest edges full of False Solomon's Seal (Maianthemum racemosum) in bloom. Its plume of tiny creamy flowers almost perfectly hid the pure white of the trilliums. Underfoot in the mowed zones along the sides of the roads, Wild Stonecrop (Sedum ternatum) was blooming in some areas while Rue Anemone (Anemonella thalictroides) was blooming in others. Violets were everywhere.

Behind the sign at one entrance to the park, swallowtail butterflies were sitting on the bare ground, drinking water from yesterday's rain.

Swallowtail butterflies drinking on the ground.

In the countryside around Gatlinburg, we saw the Yellow Trillium (Trillium luteum) everywhere along the edges of the forests. They seemed almost as common as dandelions. They are abundant up to about 3200 ft. elevation, where they suddenly disappear.

Trillium luteum with a strong green tinge on the outside of the petals.
Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Much less common is the pure white Sweet Trillium (Trillium simile), which is distinguished from its close relative, the White Wake Robin (Trillium erectum var. album) by its wider, showier petals. It seems to grow up to about 2500 ft. elevation. Pure T. erectum album seems to be found only above about 3000 ft. elevation, and between, the two white species appear to intergrade. Above 3000 ft., T. erectum album continues on up to over 5000 ft. in places.

Trillium simile. Note the gnats on the flower -- possible pollinators?

There were mountain glades covered with the White Trillium (Trillium grandiflorum), whose flowers turn pink just before they wilt. I've never seen so many trilliums in one place before in my life, and I started out in life on a farm in north central Indiana, where Spring Wildflower Walks were an annual tradition.

Claytonia caroliniana

At the very top of the mountains, at around 5000 ft. on the road up to Newfound Gap and Clingman's Dome, the ground was full of Broad Leafed Spring Beauty (Claytonia caroliniana) with the occasional yellow Trout Lily (Erythronium umbilicatum) in bud. Here in central Indiana, the local yellow Trout Lily, Erythronium americanum, bloomed a few weeks ago. Up in the very high areas, the only trillium was the occasional T. erectum album. At the highest limits of this plant's range, over 5000 ft. elevation, some of the plants have pink or rose colored blooms, suggesting the influence of the northern red or brown flowered Purple Trillium (T. erectum, var. erectum).

Erythronium umbilicatum at 5000 ft.

Much less common were Trillium rugelii, a white nodding species similar to the northern T. cernuum, and the red nodding species, T. vaseyi. You need a guide, which I had, to find these. Rarer still are T. undulatum and T. catesbaei; we have not seen these at all.

Trillium rugelii

Trillium rugelii has dark red or purple anthers and may have ether a red or a pale ovary.

Good gardening,

Jim

The rose red Corydalis solida 'Beth Evans' and 'George P. Baker' are in bloom.

Corydalis 'Beth Evans'

Corydalis kuznetzovii is also freshly in bloom; but C. angustifolia 'Georgian White', from Mr. Janis Ruksans' Bulb Nursery in Latvia, is seeding around the edge of the woodland. I'm quite pleased by this.

Corydalis kuznetzovii

Fritillaria pallida is coming up, and F. thunbergii is up but with only blind shoots (i.e., no flower buds). There seems to be no sign yet of any of the F. camschatcensis.

Trillium nivale bloomed a week or two ago, and some of the flowers are still present. I tried hand pollinating them, but there was very little fresh ripe pollen in evidence, even on warm, sunny days. The other Indiana native Trillium, T. grandiflorum, T. flexipes, and T. recurvatum, are pushing up. T. recurvatum is already showing buds, but the other two are just a bundle of leaves so far.

Trillium cuneatum and T. sessile are also up, the few surviving plants I have of each, and they have flower buds this year. There is only a single sessile left, but there are two cuneatum with flower buds. A couple of T. luteum are up and seem to have a flower bud this year. That would be nice!

Trillium luteum in 2004

A few years ago, I bought several trillium plants of each of several species, including T. cernuum, T. vaseyii, T. catesbaei, and T. simile. None of the plants labeled "T. cernuum" looked like it might be that species. As for the others, none of those are up yet; and I'm afraid none of them have survived.

Claytonia virginica is up and in bud, at least in a couple places. Eranthis cilicica bloomed a week or two ago, and it has seeded around a little bit; that's good, because the original plants are gone from their spot. The native Dicentra, cuculata and canadensis, are up and showing flower buds.

Primula veris is in bud, and a few small plants of Primula vulgaris survive. P. veris survives, blooms, and seeds around a bit; but P. vulgaris is a short lived plant here, at best. That's a pity, because P. vulgaris is my favorite. I had some other species of Primula in the woodland garden for a few years, but they have all apparently disappeared.

It's still too early for the Arisaema to be coming up, but the Anemonella thalictroides are starting to bloom in the same bed.

In Indiana, our native Trillium species are pretty clear cut, not easily confused with one another. The only likely confusion might come between T. flexipes and T. cernuun; but T. cernuum is found only in the far northwestern counties of the State, and there it is exceedingly rare. In the Southeastern States, many purported species run into each other and probably hybridize like mad. It makes life very interesting for the local Trillium enthusiasts down there.

Good gardening,

Jim

Besides which, the big greenhouse, home of our clivias, has needed some repair and maintenance work. Most of that is now done. The circuit board on the environmental controller had to be replaced, which was expensive but quick, once the board got here. Then I had to get the shade system working again. That took a lot more work, and I needed my son-in-law for a good deal of it.

A couple of the outdoor sensors, including the light intensity (sunlight) sensor that should tell the environmental computer when to close the shades and when to open them, seems to be dead. Another tricky repair job in the offing, I'm afraid. The wind speed sensor also seems to be dead. It tells the computer when it has to close all the vents and run the exhaust fans on high because a wind storm is starting! We need that one in this part of the country!

Winter held on long and hard this spring. The Narcissus are only up about 4 inches so far, and there is no color yet on their flower buds. The only Trillium up in my woodland garen so far is T. nivale, the Snow Trillium. I've been pollinating them like mad because a friend wants some seeds of this species. It really does not look like Spring yet in central Indiana.

In the greenhouses, the Clivia have been in bloom for the past two weeks. We had great bloom on Chubb Peach plants were bought from Sean Chubb a year ago, and on some of the Victorian Peach mother plants we got from Victor Murillo at about the same time.

Then some of the Solomone Red plants bloomed, and this year they have flowers that look as red as Clivia flowers ever seem to get in Indiana. When those plants arrived here, they were starting to flower and the colors were pale, pastel orange, almost pink. That now seems to have been due to weather conditions at the Solomone greenhouse near Monterey, California. Dark days, overcasat or trainy, can lead to red flowers that are faded out from lack of strong light to bring up the anthocyanin pigments.

Two old favorites also bloomed this year for the first time since they suffered badly from a very rainy summer outdoors, before the big greenhouse was built: 'Vico Yellow' (from tissue culture in Japan) and my own yellow, 'Aurean Majesty' from a batch of seeds from South Africa.

I've been busy pollinating clivias, but the flowers are about finished for this spring. Now to wait till autumn to see whether I get any seeds from these crosses. We are running out of space for startng clivia seeds, so I'm busy trying to sort through and organize our pots and trays of clivia seedlings. I may or may not have more space when I finish, but at least I'll know what we actually have growing and where they are.

To thin things out a bit, I've listed three types of unbloomed seedlings of yellow clivias in the web price list. I suspect by the time my sorting and counting is finished, I'll be able to add some more seedlings to the price list. All of these seedling plants are growing in 5½-inch square plastic pots, which is a size of about ½ gallon, more or less. The plants are 1½ to about 3 years old and have all been repotted at least once.

The Midwest Clivia Group

We had some Midwest Clivia folks at the greenhouse on Saturday, March 8th. We ended up being rather scattered over the calendar this year, so we should try to get together on one weekend next year. Judging by the flowering, I think that Saturday, March 14, 2009, would be a better time.

Shown left to right are Bonnie Ion, Patrick Ion, Rimmer de Vries, and Tedd Gorman.

Good gardening,

Jim

There was a problem with the enviroonmental control computer in the Clivia greenhouse a few weeks ago. I finally installed a replacement motherboard on Wednesday, so the heating and cooling are once again computer controlled. The heaters are wired through double-pole double-throw switches, so they can be controlled either by the environmental computer or by conventional thermostats. The coolers are left out of the circuit when the computer is off-line.

There are still problems to sort out, including why the sunlight sensor seems to be dead. And what happened to the wind speed meter? At least the outside temperature and the wind direction sensors seem to still be working. I foresee a long day on the phone with customer support (a very nice guy named Randy) at Wadsworth Controls in Colorado. I suspect the problem was a near-miss by lightning, when we had a thunderstorm here in February.

We had planned to have the Midwest Clivia group get together here tomorrow, Saturday, but this morning I sent out a Clivia Alert note suggesting Sunday would be a better day for it -- the snow should have stopped by then.

The Midwest Clivia group if very informal, and is composed of whoever shows up for get-togethers. A few of us went over to Columbus last weekend, just to get a look at one member's greenhouse. There were some nice plants in bloom. We have some plants in bloom now too, but didn't have last weekend. Next weekend might be even better here, if anyone wants to drop in.

We have some Belgians in bloom, and they are orange this year. Last year, they were decidedly light pastels, but that may have been due to their having spent some days in a dark box on their way from Belgium to Indiana in the previous autumn.

We have several Chubb Peach plants in bud, and some Victorian Peach as well. The Victorian Peach plants are mother plants from Victor himself. Some Solomone Yellows are also in bud, and a couple Solomone Reds as well. I'm not sure what color the Solomone Reds are going to turn out to be in our greenhouse.

There are a couple of Australia yellows from Dash Geoghegan (sp?) in bud as well. Only one of them bloomed last year, and it had marvelous flowers with wide petals. That particular one is not going to bloom this year. I'm eager to see what the others look like. I expect to cross them with 'Vico Yellow' and with 'Aurean Majesty', both of which have flowers that open nicely, and both of which have scapes growing on this year.

If the sun ever comes out again, I'll get some photos of the clivia blooms and share them here in the blog.

It's hard to believe, but Daylight Saving Time starts tomorrow morning! There was a recent study that showed that going to DST actually increases power usage compared to staying on standard time all year long. Having DST start so early is probably just the retail merchants and shopping mall owners buying off politicians; so what else is new? An honest politician is just one who stays bought, so they say.....

Good gardening,

Jim

The Midwest Clivia group will meet on Saturday, March 8th, from 12 noon till 4 PM (very approximately). It you want to join us for lunch on Saturday, please RSVP by Monday, March 3rd.

In the other greenhouses, Lachenalia pustulata has its purple flowers open. L. carnosa has its white flowers with purple tips open, and L. rosea is in bloom. The L. latifolia are just starting to show their scapes in the centers of the plants.

Oxalis obtusa, with pink veined flowers, is proving to be quite floriferous in my greenhouse. Most Oxalis don't flower well in our dark winter days. O. purpurescens has nice rose-red flowers, but produces very few of them and only opens them on very bright sunny days. O. obtusa seems to be a good pot plant for winter in a sunny window.

A large Zantedeschia aethiopica that I have kept growing all winter long has two of its white funnels in bloom. It is getting quite a lot of good light where it is sitting. It is also getting fed regularly with dilute (ca. 100 ppm nitrogen) soluble 20-10-20 in its water. It is at least 3 feet high, and seems about to out-grow its 2-gallon pot (22 cm X 22 cm).

Two winter-growing Herperantha are in bloom: H. bachmannii has loads of its pure white flowers open all the time, and H. cuculata has a very few buds that open only at night, and do not last long at all. H. bachmannii is by far the better pot plant for winter bloom in a very sunny spot. Ours produces a zillion tiny offsets.

Scadoxus puniceus is blooming now, as it does every year at this time. It's orange flowers inside the bronze bracts make it look like a paintbrush full of bright orange paint. S. puniceus is by far the most reliable of the Scadoxus plants we grow. It needs warmth, water, and shade from February through September, when it is in leaf.

The Ipheion are in full bloom now. They all have star-shjaped flowers 1 to 1½ inches across, one flower per stem. I. uniflorum 'Froyle Mill' has purple star-shaped flowers, I. uniflorum 'Charlotte Bishop' has pinkish flowers, we have an unnamed white form in bloom, and I. 'Rolf Fiedler' has clear blue flowers. 'Rolf Fiedler' has recently been given its own species name, but I've lost track of what the new name is. These make good windowsill bulbs for pots. We grow them in pots 5 or 6 inches across and deep. they can go outdoors in summer, under dappled shade, until perhaps August. We keep them dry at least a couple of months before we start watering again inside the greenhouse in winter.

Some things are in bud, including Ferraria crispa, Brodiaea pallida, and the small Ornithogalum apertum. The ornithogalum has a clump of many helically twisted leaves up to 5 or 6 inches long.

Winter has hung on tenaciously all through February. We seem to have a winter storm passing through about every five or six days, with barely one day of moderate weather following each. We can't ship tender plants in this weather, so we are simply holding all orders until the weather breaks. We need 5 or 6 days in a row of above-freezing weather to dare to ship plants; so far, we have just not had that since November.

Good gardening,

Jim

In the early 1980s, I read a fascinating little book by Vern Grant, called "Plant Speciation." It laid out, in what I thought was a fairly straight forward way, where new plant species might come from. Among the cases in point were the rain lilies. Grant used them as examples of new species arising from polyploidy and from parthenogenic mechanisms.

I'm using mostly the names of the genes as they were described for the dwarf cress, Arabidopsis thaliana, which is the "lab rat" or "fruit fly" for plant biologists. Arabidopsis thaliana is a small species, easy to propagate in the lab, with a few large chromosomes, and one from which it has been possible to isolate a large number of mutants.

Almost 20 years ago, it was found that there are a set of specific genes that lead a new shoot to form a flower. Because there were initially three general types found, they were referred to as the A, B, and C classes. If you inactivated certain of the genes, you did not get any petals in the flower. This was therefor called APETALA. When it was found that there were two genes that caused loss of petals when mutated, they ended up with APETALA1 (AP1) and APETALA3 (AP3). It turns out that you need two classes of genes to make petals: A and also B. APETALA1 is the A gene and APETALA3 is one of the B genes. APETALA probably comes from "a-" meaning without and "petal." A second B gene was found, and given the name PISTILLATA (PI). I haven't tracked down where that name came from. It turns out that there have to be functioning copies of both the B genes in order to have full, normal flower development. APETALA3 and PISTILLATA form what is called a "heterodimer," e.g., a structure made up of two protein molecules that are not identical.

The C gene is necessary for formation of the sexual parts of the flower. When it is mutated, there are no stamens and no pistil, so it was named AGAMOUS (AG). If one of the B genes is mutated, you get the pistil but no stamens. The formation of stamens therefor requires functional B genes and the C gene. The C gene alone is needed for formation of the pistil.

When the A, B, and C genes are expressed ectopically (in non-flower parts of the plant), there are no flower parts formed. This indicated that more genes are needed to get sepals, petals, stamens, or pistils than just the ABC set.

The Scheme for Floral Gene Interactions

Those additional genes are now referred to as the SEPALLATA (SEP) genes, and are often called the E class of genes. There are 4 of these genes, SEP1, SEP2, SEP3, and SEP4. These function somewhat redundantly, but in the absence of all 4 of the SEP genes, there are no flower parts produced. Which SEP genes are expressed depends on when and where one looks. The discovery that a fourth class of genes is required has led to recent papers calling this the "ABCE" model.

The "quartet model" for how these gene product work is based on studies of protein-protein interactions. The quartet AP1-AP1-SEP-SEP leads to formation of sepals. The quartet AP1-AP3-PI-SEP leads to petals; AP3-PI-AG-SEP induces stamens; and AG-AG-SEP-SEP forms carpels (ovary and pistil). Protein chemists would refer to these quartets as tetramers, since the four separate protein molecules involved are physically associated with each other.

All of these genes are members of the MADS-box family (except for AP2). The MADS structure is named for the four very different species in which such genes were found: Mouse, Arabidopsis, Drosophila (fruit fly), and Saccharomyces (yeast). MADS genes have also been found in mammals, including humans. This is clearly a very old motif in the history of life.

The blooms on the Haemanthus pauculifolius are fraying, and they will be the last Haemanthus to bloom until H. montanus blooms in June. At the same time, Scadoxus puniceus are starting to show signs of life, and one of them has a scape half way up. They usually bloom somewhere between late January and early March in the cool greenhouse (low temperatures dip into the high 30s F).

In the warm greenhouse (pretty constant at about 55 ° F) only Nerine undulata is in bloom. We won't see any new Nerine flowers now until sometime in July, once the undulata fade. I've had some small N. humilis growing for several years, but they do not seem to get much larger, they do not flower, and I suspect they have a viral or a fungal disease. I will probably have to get rid of them.

My Nerine sarniensis hybrids are looking good. Taking a tip from Nick de Rothschild, I tried feeding them, using soluble fertilizer with 0% nitrogen. They have perked up tremendously! I formulated my own fertilizer, using finely crystalline reagent grades of Dibasic Potassium Phosphate (i.e., K₂HPO₄ ), Monobasic Potassium Phosphate (i.e., KH₂PO₄ ), and Potassium Sulfate (i.e., K₂SO₄ ), very thoroughly dry mixed. I used equal parts by weight of each of the three chemicals, giving a moderate level of phosphate (P) and a high dose of potassium (K). I dissolve about ½ teaspoonful of the mixture in 1200 mL (about 5 cups) of water. We have to avoid using more than tiny traces of nitrogen on the broadleaf Nerine species and hybrids, because feeding them nitrogen seems to release latent virus infections that they all carry. You can ruin a collection of broadleaf Nerine (i.e., hybrids of Nerine bowdenii, sarniensis, and several others) by dumping a little bit of nitrogen on them.

So, Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, a Merry Yule, Winter Solstice, Saturnalia! I may have missed a few. In any case, this is winter in the Northern Hemisphere, a time that tends to be bleak and uncomfortable if left to itself. Our flowers are deserting us, so let's be thankful for our friends.

We wish all the best for you, your families, and your friends.

Jim & Irma Shields

The Hyacinth Family, Hyacinthaceae, is well represented with many genera in South Africa. One of the less well known of these is the genus Massonia. There are about a half dozen species to be found in some bulb encyclopedias, although there may be many more in nature. All seem to be winter growing plants, and are found mainly in the winter rainfall areas of the Cape provinces.

Massonia generally have two leaves, which lie prostrate on the ground. In my greenhouse here in central Indiana, they are more often semi-erect. The flowers are usually white or very pale shades of pink or yellow. The stamens are longer than the petals and sepals.

The largest species seems to be Massonia depressa, with leaves that reach 6 to 7 inches in length and width. Other species tend to have leaves only 2 to 3 inches long and wide. M. depressa has smooth leaves that are dull green to grey-green. The flowers are many and white, sessile (i.e., borne at ground level).

Good gardening,

Jim

Planting Hippeastrum Seeds

We used to germinate papery seeds, and especially Hippeastrum seeds, by floating them on water in a clear glass or plastic container covered with clear Saran ® plastic wrap and setting them under the lights.

That works, but you have to remember to plant the germinated seeds in regular seed starting mix before they rot. It is also very easy to damage the radicle (the first root), which can be fata to very young seedlings.

So now we start them in pots. A communal pot is filled ¾ full with seed starting potting mix, then that is covered with a layer of sand about ½ inch thick. the seeds are inserted vertically (on edge) half way into the sand. The pot is covered with clear plastic wrap and set is a pan or saucer of water until the potting mix and sand are thoroughly wetted. Finally, the pot is placed in a saucer on a shelf under the lights. Water is kept in the saucer and the plastic cover is kept in place until it looks as if all the seeds have germinated and are showing some green leaf. Germination is not necessarily as complete as in the floatation method, but after germination there are far fewer losses due to handling the delicate young seedlings.

This same methid, on edge in sand, works well with Rhodophiala, Zephyranthes, Cyrtanthus, and even Worsleya. It should be noted here that the floatation method definitely does NOT work for Cyrtanthus.

Starting Clivia and Haemanthus Seeds

Fleshy seeds like Haemanthus and Clivia are started by planting on the surface of the usual seed starting mixture. We push the seeds part way into the firm potting mix. The pot is then placed into a pan or saucer of water and left until the potting medium is soaked completely up to the surface. The pot or pots are finally set in a tray or large saucer, placed on a shelf under lights. No plastic covering is used. Then the tray is placed in a shelf under lights.

Growing Seedlings On

Clivia, Cyrtanthus, Haemanthus and Hippeastrum seedlings are kept under lights for at least a year, and usually for 18 to 30 months. They received water whenever dry, and there is no resting period. Seedling bulbs in the Amaryllis Family can be kept in continuous growth for up to two years without any dormant or rest period. Hippeastrum seedling bulbs can be kept in continuous growth until they flower. This avoids what can be huge losses if small seedling bulbs are allowed to dry out.

Communal Pots or Individual Pots

In the past, I have ruined many Haemanthus seedlings by disturbing the young seedlings before they were large enough to tolerate it. As damaging as letting them go dormant at too young an age, transplanting seedling bulbs before they are 3 or 4 years old can set them back so that they take many years longer to bloom than otherwise.

For this reason, All our Clivia seeds and many of our Haemanthus seeds are started in idividual pots. Clivia seeds are planted in individual 2¾-in (70 mm.) square pots that are 3¾ in. (95 mm.) deep. They stay there until their roots begin to grow out the drainage holes in the bottom. They can be transplanted into a large pot with minimal disturbance of the roots.

Haemanthus and Crinum seeds are planted in individual plastic pots 5½-in. square by 6 in. deep.

Seed Starting Mixtures

My favorite mixture for starting most seeds is made by mixing 2 parts by volume Promix BX Biofungicide with one part by volume of brown fill sand. The use of the Biofungicide form of the Promix allows us to keep the potting mixture moist at all times without increasing the danger of fungal infection. The biofungicide itself is a natural strain of Bacillus selected because it preys on fungi. It is not a "GM" (genetically manipulated) organism,

We sometimes start Crinum seeds in our usual gritty mix for mature bulbs. This is made by mixing 2 parts by volume Promix BX Biofungicide with one part by volume of brown fill sand and 1 part by volume of granite chick starter grit (about 1/8th inch or 3 mm mesh).

Good gardening,

Jim

There is very little blooming in the greenhouses now, so we are turning our attention to getting plants ready for spring. The watering has been turned back to once every 21 days in the big greenhouse. The struggle for the next month or two will be to keep the temperatures in the greenhouses where we want them to be. Number 2 greenhouse was too cool this morning, thanks in part to a gas heater that did not want to work. Fortunately the other two gas heaters were working as they should. So I turned on a couple supplemental electric heaters, until I can get the heating/cooling people out here to see what is wrong.

Now is a good time to start thinking about amaryllis bulbs (actually Hippeastrum) for bloom in the house. The Dutch Hybrids are available everywhere now, and are more or less guaranteed to bloom right out of the box.

Maybe I can deal with some of the Dutch hybrid amaryllis when they start blooming here in a month or so.

My interest here is mainly in the wild species of Hippeastrum from South America. They are hard to get and trickier to grow than the hybrids in commerce. Some of the recent hybrid introductions, however, are selections or hybrids of the wild species. Hippeastrum cybister in particular has yielded some beautiful new introductions in recent years.

Hippeastrum cybister

There are almost no hybrid Haemanthus in commerce, so far as I know. One nursery in the United Kingdom has offered bulbs of Haemanthus [albiflos X coccineus]. Although at one time sold under the name Haemanthus 'King Alfred', that name properly refers to Scadoxus [puniceus X multiflorus katherinae] as I understand the situation. This Haemanthus hybrid is capable of producing huge leaves, perhaps reaching 8 inches wide by 18 inches long. When it (rarely) flowers, the inflorescence is a pale pink or off-white, and smaller than either albiflos or coccineus usually bloom. Like albiflos, it produces offsets freely, which may be why it got into commerce at all. It is at best a curiosity.

We managed to produce a cross between H. humilis hirsutus (seed or berry parent) and H. coccineus (pollen parent) a few years ago. Those plants have been very interesting as they have grown. One of the first things noted was that the leaves of most of the seedlings had a narrow, deep red line on the margins of the leaves. This is not a trait I have seen in any plants of H. humilis hirsutus that I have grown, but frequently occurs in H. coccineus. That convinced me that at least those plants with red edges were true hybrids rather than accidental selfings of the mother (seed) plant, hirsutus.

Catching Up with Blooms

Sternbergia and Rhodophiala are genera in the Amaryllis Family (Amaryllidaceae). Two of their species, at least, seem to be fairly hardy here in central Indiana. As noted, both are Fall blooming, a handy trait where not too many flowers bloom in autumn.

Sternbergia lutea

I have three patches of Sternbergia outdoors in the ground, and all are doing well. One has increased so much that I need to make a note to lift and separate the bulbs next spring or summer. I can make more patches of Sternbergia around the place with them. They seem to be perfectly hardy, but they don't like weed competition.

Rhodophiala bifida (diploid form)

I have one patch of Rhodophiala bifida, the triploid form common in gardens in the Southern States. I just checked on it, and the leaves are up but there were no blooms this year. It is being crowded out by a huge clump of Iris sanguinea (I think). Those will need to be moved next spring if they are to survive. I need to get more of those bulbs and try them in a lot more places.

Lycoris radiata radiata (triploid form)

A species that is not in bloom this year is Lycoris radiata radiata, also a triploid garden form from the Southern States. I have one patch of it, and the leaves are just starting to come up. There are no signs of blooms this year. It may need some mulch in winter, and it may have suffered from lack of water during our hot and unusually dry summer this year. In 2000, it bloomed in early September here. I usually expect to see it bloom sometime in late October.

Catching Up with Currency

I've also been catching up on the catalogs we issue and our prices. You might not have noticed, but the value of the U.S. Dollar against the Euro, the British Pound, and the Japanese Yen has been falling. It has also fallen against the South African Rand, from ca. 7.2 Rand per Dollar down to 6.56 Rand per Dollar yesterday (according to this morning's Wall Street Journal).

I've had to accordingly adjust the selling prices of plants that we buy from South Africa. That will be painful for anyone who has been putting off ordering one of the beautiful 'Cameron Peach' clivias! I certainly regret this for my part.

This will also affect the costs and hence the prices of future batches of 'Chubb Peach' and of 'Cynthia's Dream' plants, all of which come from South Africa. Eventually it will also affect the prices of Belgian hybrids as well.

Catching Up with Yellow Clivia

I've been reorganizing the group 1 and the group 2 yellow clivia types (in my own mind). For the group 1 gene locus, I see the yellows as "group 1 allele a," and the Chubb Peach plants as "group 1 allele b." The orange allele at the group 1 gene locus we can call "allele w" for wild type. Nice and neat, even simple.

The wild type group 1 plants would be [1w/1w] while the yellow group 1 plants would be [1a/1a]. Cross an orange with a yellow, and all the first generation offspring would be [1w/1a]. Chubbs Peach plants could have either [1a/1b] or [1b/1b] at the group 1 loci, since Chubbs Peach seems to be at least somewhat dominant (but see below). All this is pretty straight-forward.

Here is where it gets a little tricky. For the group 2 yellow gene locus, I see the orange form as "group 2 allele w" (again for wild type); the plain yellow as "group 2 allele a." For the yellows that have orange or pink on tepal edges or at damaged spots, it would be "group 2 allele b;" and for the peaches that are compatible with group 2 yellows, "group 2 allele c."

The group 2 wild type oranges would be [2w/2w] while the unspotted group 2 yellows would be [2a/2a]. If 'Sunrise Sunset' really is a group 2 yellow, then it is probably [2b/2b] since it sometimes gets orange or pink spots on the petals. My guess is that 'Tessa' would be [2c/2c]. What would a [2a/2b] look like? What do things like [2a/2c] and [2b/2c] look like? Only a lot more careful breeding experiments or some DNA work, or both, will settle the questions.

I expect that in the long run we may well find that the "dominant" alleles are actually only partially dominant, or dose-dependant. For instance, I see that the flowers of a few of my Chubb Peach seedlings have a much deeper tint of peach than most of them do. Could these few be [1b/1b] homozygous plants while most are heterozygous forms, [1a/1b]? Or do the more intensely colored Chubbs Peach have a new modifier gene that is responsible, located at a different gene locus?

The usual wild type orange Clivia miniata would by [1w/1w; 2w/2w] in my notation -- homozygous for orange at both genes.

Jim

Using Google Scholar, at http://scholar.google.com/ , I found an interesting old (2001) review of Flavonoid Biosynthesis by Brenda Winkel-Shirley in PLANT PHYSIOLOGY, June 2001, vol. 126, pp. 485-493; see http://www.plantphysiol.org/cgi/content/full/126/2/485 .

Hammett et al. reported that red and orange Clivia flowers contain pelargonidins (for orange and brick-red colors) as well as a bit of delphinidins (purples and blues). The enzymes that convert the chalcone product naringenin to delphinidin precursors are P450 hydroxylases, Flavonoid 3'-Hydroxylase and Flavonoid 3',5'-Hydroxylase (F3'5'H). If Clivia flowers contain delphinidins, then these enzymes are probably present.

It seems that to get significant production of delphinidins, you need an additional enzyme, a specific cytochrome b5 (cyt b5). Introducing the petunia F3'5'H and cyt b5 genes into carnations converted the red flowers to a deep purple color. The cyt b5 apparently keeps the F3'5'H primed and running.

Labs have also been identifying genes that regulate flavonoid biosynthesis. Already well known were genes R, B, C1, and P in maize and DELILAH in snapdragon. Some newly reported included AN11 in petunia; TTG1 in Arabidopsis, and MP1 in maize. One of these, AN11, seems to regulate another regulatory gene, AN2, in petunia.

The flavonoid biosynthetic enzymes seem to be grouped together in a multi-enzyme complex, anchored to the rough endoplasmic reticulum (rER) -- a site of protein biosynthesis in the cell's cytoplasm. Multi-enzyme complexes are well known in biochemistry, and they seem to be organized for rapid and efficient processing of a multi-step biosynthetic pathway.

To get all the way to the colored pigment molecules, you have to have all the biosynthetic genes working and probably all of the regulatory genes as well. Something in this complicated system is disrupted in the group 1 yellow clivias; something else is disrupted in the group 2 yellow clivias.

Needless to say, I have not absorbed all of this yet! Note that bits and pieces of the puzzle are being found in a wide variety of different plant species, However, most of it is coming from work on Arabidopsis (a cress), which is the species of choice for most plant molecular genticists.

Good gardening,

Jim

There are a news item (p. 31)and a research paper (p. 113) in the 5 October 2007 issue of the journal SCIENCE on the finding that methyl salicylate (oil of wintergreen) is the messenger substance produced in infected tissue in a plant that is carried through the phloem to all other parts of the plant. There, it is converted by the enzyme SABP2 (an esterase) into free salicylic acid. Salicylic acid is the compound that actually triggers the resistance reaction in the plant.

The Chinese Chestnut trees seem to be quite resistant to the blight. I planted a half dozen of them over 25 years ago, and they have been producing nice crops of nuts every autumn for the last 8 or 10 years now.

While the American Chestnut trees were tall, majestic giants of the forest with single trunks, the Chinese Chestnut trees are bushy, having several trunks and reaching a height of only 15 to 25 feet.

The Chinese nuts have a pretty good "chestnut" flavor, but it depends very much on which tree the nuts come from. The three trees I got from Millers or Stark Brothers nurseries have large nuts with very good flavor; the squirrels love them. The trees from the National Arbor Day Foundation produce much smaller nuts with either no flavor or a somewhat bitter taste. Even the squirrels will not eat them.

We cure the fallen chestnuts at room temperature for a week to 10 days, partly to improve the flavor and partly so we can see which ones are going to be wormy. Before we started spraying the chestnuts trees in summer, most of the nuts were wormy. Now, usually only a few are wormy. You apparently have to spray past the chestnuts' flowering time in mid-June to stop the worms. The "worms" actually look to me like the larvae (maggots) of some sort of fly (Diptera).

After they have been culled and cured, we score the skin with a sharp small knife and freeze those we aren't going to eat right away. Chestnuts do not keep well in a refrigerator; they get moldy very quickly in the fridge. On the other hand, they keep for years frozen in zip-top plastic freezer bags.

You can fix chestnuts, whether imported Italian nuts or home-grown Chinese nuts, in a variety of ways. My favorite is freshly roasted. Regardless of how you cook them, you have to score the shiny brown skin before you heat them. Otherwise, the moisture in the nuts turns to high pressure steam and the nuts can explode! That is very messy, at best.

Besides freshly roasted chstnuts, you can boil them for later use in chestnut dressing or stuffing, or added to vegetables. While brussels sprouts are not usually my favorite vegetable, when cooked with chestnuts and well seasoned, they are actually delicious. Boiled chestnuts are also good added to red cabbage. This is an area well worth some exploration and experimentation.

As a dessert, boiled chestnuts are pureed and then served with whipped cream, meringues, or other sweets. You might try the puree with chocolate sauce and then whipped cream. In Europe, it is served as vermicelli after having been pressed out through some sort of sieve.

We also have some Carpathian ("English") Walnut trees, which sometimes produce a useful crop of nuts. They are very sensitive to late spring freezes, and we had such a freeze this past spring. So it looks as if our Carpathian Walnut trees are completely barren this year. By the way, the English apparently refer to these trees as Persian Walnuts. Our trees came from a nursery, perhaps Millers, and were grown from trees found in the Carpathian Mountains in Eastern Europe. They seem to be fairly hardy here in Indiana.

We have some regular native Black Walnut trees, and some of these are heavily loaded with nuts this year. I will leave most of those to the squirrels, if a diet of soft, easily eaten chestnuts has not spoiled them for tougher fare.

We have a pair of selected Shelbark Hickory trees, whose large nuts are just as tasty as pecans, but much hardier here in our cold winters. The shells are however very thick and hard, and you need a hammer or a special black walnut cracker to open them. The weather this past spring seems to have affected the hickories badly, as they have very few nuts this year. Hickory nuts are also susceptible to what look to be the same worms we find in unsprayed chestnuts.

Hazelnuts or filberts also grow here, and they can have nuts. You need at least two bushes for cross-pollination, and we have quite a few more. The hazelnut bushes we have seem to be very variable as to nut quality, and only one of the several bushes has both heavy crops and large, tasty nuts. Squirrels love these too, and will start harvesting them in August, long before they look ripe to human eyes. Some years, they get almost every single decent hazel nut. The squirrels of course ignore the nuts on the bushes that we don't care for.

We have tried hybrid American-Chinese chestnuts, but the small trees available did not survive even one summer in our field. We tried butternuts and heartnuts (both related to walnuts), but neither survived here. We tried a hardy pecan, and lost it the first winter. There have been a lot of interesting nut tress that we were not able to grow here, for one reason or another. Still, it's a great feeling when you start harvesting your own nut crops in autumn!

Good gardening,

Jim

The European and Central Asian species appear to be quite hardy here in central Indiana, USDA zone 5. The spring flowering and mediterranean species have not done well for me, not even in the greenhouse.

They can be grown from seed, but it is excruciatingly slow. Almost everyone who wants to grow them buys the bulbs as they are offered commercially, meaning a few traditional clones are about all you can find. The flowers of all the varieties I have here look pink to me, but other colors have been ascribed to many forms.

The first variety to flower here every summer is Colchicum byzantinum. These have been flowering here for a couple of weeks now.

A miniature nerine, only about 9 inches tall with a flower about 1½ inches wide, Nerine filamentosa is starting to bloom now. Its thread-like leaves are only about 6 inches long. It's easy to grow from seed. These are growing in a plastic 6-inch azalea pot.

Crinum erubescens is a New World Crinum from South America, related to C. americanum. Although the usual locality for erubescens is Brazil, this plant originated in Peru.

The first albiflos and the barkerae bloomed during our spell of 90-degree heat, before there was any hint of cooler weather. Now that the days and nights are both getting a little cooler, I expect more of the coccineus to start showing scapes.

Haemanthus albiflos

In 2005, I was mainly concerned with getting some hybrids. Several years ago, I got hybrid seeds of Haemanthus [humilis hirsutus X coccineus], which have been quite vigorous so far. Last year, one of them even flowered -- the flowers were pale, slightly pinkish, and not impressive. This year, I hope to produce at least a few hybrid seeds from the cross [coccineus X montanus], using the bit of montanus pollen I stored in June or July, when montanus bloomed. Now I wish I had saved more of the montanus pollen. H. montanus and H. coccineus seem to be the two most cold-hardy species. I'd like to get a hybrid hardy in zone 7.

Haemanthus barkerae
Starting to open

There are differences between H. barkerae from the northern end of its range and those from the southern end. My seedlings that have bloomed so far all appear to be of the northern form, but one pot of the southern form has its first-ever scape showing at the neck of the bulb. It may not make it to actual flowering this year, but very probably will bloom next year. I hope to cross the northern barkerae X southern barkerae, to see how the F1 look. The northern form matures from seed in about 5 years in my greenhouse, while the southern form takes 9 or 10 years to flower from seed, again in my greenhouse.