The Bulb Maven

Bessera elegans

This beautiful dainty bulb comes from Mexico and is related to our own Brodiaeas, belonging to the Family Themidaceae.  It grows in similar conditions, and comes in a variety of colors, the most commonly available one being a bright orangey red with inner cream markings.

IThere are other colors in my collection, the most spectacular being the purple one.

I have two collections that are deep red, one with no markings inside and one with cream markings similar to the orange one.

Some years ago a kind person sent me some wild collected seed and said there had been different colors in the collection.  Most turned out to be purple, but one is a beautiful fuchsia pink.    The pink one has white inner markings.  

There are, apparently, other colors, including a pure white one, and I would dearly love that one.  

Bessera are not difficult to grow, the only problem is acquiring them.  They grow in the summer and bloom late in the season.  They are blooming now, having started sending up their beautiful flowers in September and will be dormant by the end of November.  They must be kept absolutely dry during their dormancy or they will rot, and I grow them in a fast draining mixture of potting soil and pumice.  They set seed readily, but are slow to bloom from seed, taking at least four years or more.  They are well worth the trouble.

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Sprekelia

Sprekelia formosissima

I don't think I have mentioned Sprekelia until recently when my Sprekelia howardii set some seed.  Sprekelia is a very small genus of only two species, both of which are found in Mexico.  The common name is Aztec Lily, although they are not actually lilies.

Sprekelia formosissima is commonly available, and is sometimes used as a garden plant in the southern states of the USA.  It is found from Guerrero and Chiapas, though Guatemala and Honduras.

Sprekelia howardii is quite rare.  It was found in southern Mexico as recently as the year 2000, and is not generally available.  It has the same deep crimson flowers, but a much more elegant form, with petals that are like satin ribbons. My bulbs do not bloom every year and are very slowly increasing.

Both species should be grown in a fast draining mix.  They have been prone to fungal disease, so I grow them in a mix that mostly is horticultural pumice with a little organic material.  

Sprekelia howardii

This mix, and repotting regularly, has been more effective in controlling stagonospora than using fungicides.  Neither species is very hardy, so growing them outside in the garden is only possible in the mildest climates.

The seeds from Sprekelia howardii have been sown, so hopefully I will have some available in the future.

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Behria tenuiflora

This lovely Mexican species comes from Baja California, where it is fairly widespread, growing in the mountains all the way down to sea level.  I have sown seed of Behria tenuiflora four times.  Each time the seed germinated readily, but the bulbs broke dormancy very erratically, and few reached any size.  This last batch of seed was sown about three years ago, and finally I have a flower.  Perhaps I obtained a batch of seed from plants that are more suitable for my growing conditions, or maybe it was our recent hot spell that produced the flower.  The flower buds look like candy, with their bright orange and yellow stripes. 

Another Mexican species from the hot coastal regions of Oaxaca and Guerrero is Calochortus balsensis, also blooming well this year.  The brilliant yellow flowers are large, about 2" (5cm) across, and almost square.   Like some other Mexican Calochortus species, Calochortus balsensis makes bulbils in the leaf bracts, so hopefully I will be able to propagate it.

 

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Tigridia

Tigridia is a fairly large genus of about 35 species in the Family Iridaceae.  Most are from Mexico and Central America, and very few are in cultivation, with the exception of the Mexican species Tigridia pavonia.  I don't have a picture of this species, and find it rather garish, so I haven't grown it.  It is commonly available from bulb brokers, and can make a suitable garden addition where a big splash of color is wanted.

The few Tigridias I grow are diminutive species, with dainty flowers that should be inspected close up.  Some are from mountainous regions, and all are summer-growers, requiring a dry winter dormancy.  I have not found them particularly easy to maintain in cultivation, so although I do have five or six species, I am not able to offer them in the catalogue.  To the left is the lovely T. angusta.  It grows about 8-10cm tall, with flowers about 3-4cm across.

Tigridia multiflora, seen to the right, has deep ruby flowers flecked with gold, on stems about 20cm tall.

Another tiny species is T. durangense, seen here to the left, with large flowers on stems that are only 5-6cm tall.  The flowers are fleeting, but several are produced.

I have two or three yellow Tigridias, and here is T. dugesii to the right, also very tiny.

Another yellow one is T. chrysantha, here to the left, with beautiful golden flowers on 12cm stems.

I get very little seed from my Tigridias, and haven't had much luck with hand-pollination.  I used to grow them in small pots, but found they did better in larger two gallon pots, where they will multiply a little.  All are grown in a gritty, fast-draining medium, and fertilized regularly when in growth.  The dry rest in winter in a must, any moisture can cause rotting.

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The Morning Walkabout

After a long, cold, miserable spring, Mother Nature finally took pity on us, and the weather turned glorious for the Fourth of July weekend, with sunny days in the low 70F range.  The village of Ferndale, where I live, has many celebrations going on for the weekend, including a parade and a spectacular fireworks display, so the sunny weather was most welcome for the events.  Watching fireworks burst in a dense fog cloud, as can happen, is missing the point.

Without the morning fog, the dawn sky has been beautiful, the sun slowly rising above the mountains to the east to bathe the fields in a golden glow.  My morning begins before dawn, and I love to watch the sky slowly change color as the birds awaken.  When I moved to this property seven years ago, there was little birdsong, the four acre property, and the fields surrounding it, being almost completely bare of trees and shrubs.  My first two years here were completely consumed in getting the nursery up and running, but I have been planting what I hope will become a dense windbreak, and it is starting to fill in.  Now there are many more birds, since they have nesting places and shelter, and I hope this will get even better as time goes on.

Each morning I call the dogs for our morning walkabout, when we walk around the garden and the nursery area to see what we can see.  Just before this, I was in my tiny kitchen in the barn, when I heard my dogs barking outside in a very frenzied manner, quite different from their usual "someone is coming down the driveway" barking.  I went outside, and they had a hawk cornered in my little sitting area.  I thought the poor thing was injured, since it was panting and had its wings extended.  I quickly called the dogs inside, then quietly sat and watched at some distance.  It walked very cautiously past me, then took to flight, apparently none the worse for its encounter.

With the warmer weather, my small collection of Mexican bulbs are starting to bloom.  the stunningly beautiful purple Bessera elegans has opened its buds, as has the sweetly scented Milla biflora, with large waxy white flowers.

I only have a few of the Mexican Calochortus species.  Unlike those from the western USA, Mexican Calochortus grow in the summer, and are dormant in winter.  They are not as variable as the American ones, but have a charm of their own.   Here is C. marcellae to the left, and C. pringlei to the right.

I haven't taken the trouble to propagate my Mexican Calochortus species, so I don't have any available, but I usually have the different colors of Bessera, as well as Milla.  With only myself doing virtually all the work of the nursery, I have to make some difficult decisions, as far as which bulbs to propagate and which bulbs to keep just for my own enjoyment.  I have two large greenhouses, and can't put up more, for then I would need full time help, so greenhouse space is at a premium, and some bulbs will always be there just to please me.  I do get occasional requests from collectors asking "You don't happen to have .....?", and often I do have what they are seeking and can spare one or two bulbs.

Petronymphe decora has sent up buds, but will bloom a little later.  I feel very lucky to have this rare species in my collection, and usually have some bulbs to spare.

Harvesting bulbs continues.  I still have most of the California species to take out of their pots, since they bloom at the end of spring, and I am awaiting the ripening of their seeds.  I have carefully hand pollinated the Calochortus and some of the Brodiaeas, this year with good results.  It is a slow and tedious job, and sometimes I have still lost my seed and all the work I put into pollinating due to adverse weather conditions.

With summer here, my work increases considerably, and that will continue until the end of the year.  I am happy!  Although I have been called a workaholic by some friends, I take exception to that very pejorative term.  I LOVE my work.  It makes me happy just to walk into my greenhouses in the morning.  I feel blessed. 

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The Morning Walkabout

It is a shock to realize that we are almost half way through August, and that summer is edging towards autumn.  In my previous post I commented that there wasn't a lot happening in the greenhouses, but yesterday I noticed buds emerging from the pink Rhodophiala bifida (left), and also Calostemma purpureum (right), Amaryllids that bloom in late summer, heralding the onset of the autumn display of most members of the Family Amaryllidaceae, such as Nerine and many other South African members.  Hymenocallis have been blooming off an on for some time, with the dainty umbels of H. leavenworthii seen here, a very rare member of the genus from Mexico, where it grows at some elevation.  Here it is to the right.

 Summer's progress is also marked by the birds' activities.  Their songs no longer awaken me at dawn, they are probably too busy to spend much time singing, frantically feeding the gaping mouths of their babies.  The swallows have already reared one brood, and are on their second, but the parents are still pestered by their adolescent babies that badger them for food.  They are a constact source of entertainment.

In the pasture next door there is an ever changing population of horses, apparently the owners rotating horses from their other ranch.  About a month ago there was a pure white one and an ebony black one, and watching them race each other around the five acres was delightful.  Now we have a mother and her baby.  She is not at all afraid of the dogs, and seems to want to play with them.

I have been having some work done on the garden.  I had put in a small informal herb garden, and wanted a focal point, so I had the basin of a fountain put in on a stone base.  I will plant a miniature water lily in it, since I would never run a fountain, and don't actually like the movement.  Here is the full work crew, the dogs having played a supervisory role, testing the mortar to make sure it was just right. 

We are having a very wonderful summer here in the Ferndale valley.  Although other parts of the state are parched, with our morning fog, things stay lush and green all year.  The fog clears by about 10:00am, rolling back in at night, keeping the temperatures pleasantly cool.  Last summer it was very cold and foggy, but there are no complaints this year.  The County Fair opens in a couple of days, and I can see the ferris wheel from my window.  My favorite agility trial is this coming weekend, and we have been training every day, hoping to bring back ribbons.  Even if we don't win, we always have a wonderful time, for, after all, the dogs know nothing of winning or ribbons, they do it for the joy of it.  And ... for the treats, of course!!

 

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The Morning Walkabout

This is the time of year when we are away at dog trials on some weekends, having just returned from Oregon, where we did respectably well.  As soon as we are back, we slip into our routine of an early morning walk around the nursery, usually at sunrise. 

This morning gauzy, low-lying mists enveloped the fields, and as the sun rose they all turned to a brilliant orange hue.  The effect only lasted a few minutes, then the sun rose above the low banks of mist when they changed to opalescent colors before disappearing completely.

Yesterday it was so windy it was hard to work outside, so we all went off to gather seeds about an hour south of here.  There is a steep cliff by the road covered in Calochortus amabilis, and now is the time the seed is ripe.  Here they are to the left, in bloom about six weeks ago. It was a beautiful drive through the redwoods and we found a trail for the dogs to run, chasing each other happily through the poison oak (bath time when we got home).  It takes all my old rock climbing skills to get a few pods of this Calochortus, but I don't have to feel guilty about collecting them, since the seeds would undoubtedly fall on the road below where they would be doomed.

Walking around the nursery a couple of weeks ago, I noticed a little white crowned sparrow dart out from one of my Bomareas.  Usually I trim all the old stems off the Bomareas in about April or May, making room for new growth, but I had left four or five, since seed was still ripening on them.  It happened again the next day, so I investigated, and found the most perfect nest snuggled in the stems.  The eggs soon hatched, but the babies disappeared a couple of days after hatching, probably victims of the raccoons.

In the greenhouse where I grow my tender subtropical bulbs, a few things are blooming.  Bulbs from equatorial regions seem to bloom whenever they feel like it, also going dormant erratically, so my pots of Eucrosias have some dormant bulbs, some with leaves and some in bloom.  Here is Eucrosia aurantiaca, one of the more spectacular bulbs from Ecuador.  Also in bloom is the rather strange Sprekelia formosissima from Mexico, seen here to the right.  There are, I believe, two Sprekelia species, both from Mexico, S. formosissima and S. howardii, a recently described species that I have finally got my hands on, although they haven't bloomed yet.

The powder-puff blossoms of the South African Haemanthus humilis ssp. hirsutus is in bloom, white with pink bracts and very attractive.

I was very thrilled to see emerging buds on my Hymenocallis hawkesii (probably more correctly named as Ismene hawkesii).  I had obtained seedling bulbs some time ago, and now they have matured to bloom size.  This is an extremely rare species from Peru, where it grows at about 6000'. Here it is to the right.  

Work in the nursery continues with seed gathering and unpotting the dormant bulbs.  The native bulbs are the last to go dormant, and can't be harvested until their seed has ripened, so this will continue well into July.  The South African bulbs have mostly been lifted by now, with Oxalis being the first batch to be unpotted, and Oxalis orders already being shipped. 

Summer is upon us, with sunny days preceded by morning fog in our area.  The fields are being mown for hay, the cows all glossy, fat and contented.  The solstice has already passed.  I always feel a touch of sadness at the summer solstice that they days are incrementally shortening, although we will still have daylight beyond 9pm for a while.  I love these long days.  I can work in my garden until dusk or take the dogs to the beach at sunset.  I wish it would last forever. 

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Milla magnifica

I have waited a long time to see my Milla magnifica bloom, and that day has finally arrived.  It was well worth waiting for.  The umbel is huge -- about ten to twelve inches across, and hosts 22 flower buds.  The flowers are a little smaller than those of M. biflora, but they are produced in great quantity, held on stems about two feet tall.  The scent is wonderful. 

Milla biflora (a misnomer, by the way, since my bulbs produce umbels with around six to eight buds) has long ceased blooming.  Here is a picture (to the right) for comparison.   

There are other members of this Mexican genus, some are tinted blue or pink, and I would dearly love to have them, but the two I have are so rarely available, I have doubts that I will ever get that lucky.

Thank you Dylan Hannon for this wonderful bulb!

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Autumn

It is officially autumn now, and the trees are starting to show their fall tints, although in this mild coastal region we get very little compared to the splendor of the eastern forests.  I lived in Washington, D.C for four years, while in medical school, and autumn there is a magnificent affair.  At that time my love was rock-climbing, and I would go to West Virginia to climb, or to upstate New York, where the land seemed to radiate color during the autumn season.  Here it is muted, but still, the passing of the seasons has always seemed significant to me, and I welcome the change.  The swallows are still here, but massing in great flocks, swirling around the barn, getting ready for their departure south.  In their place will come the geese from the north, and all during winter the air will be filled with their cries.  This is a very soggy valley in winter, perfect for the hundreds of thousands of geese and swans that visit us.

This morning the dawn was clear, without the fog blanket that often envelopes everything in early morning.  The sky was rosy to the east, and the thin sickle of the waning moon floated above.  In the morning the stars seem to glow, quite unlike the sparkle of the evening stars (I am sure there is a scientific explanation for this), and it was a special treat this morning to see them unclouded by fog.

Although I don't grow the usual autumn blooming bulbs, like Colchicum, I have the Nerines, mentioned before, to look forward to, as well as the occasional Lycoris, some autumn blooming Crocus, Bessera, and many others.  Here is the lovely Crocus kotschyanus. 

The Bomareas are now at their peak, having to make their growth during the summer with the flower buds forming on the end of the shoots.  On the Pacific Bulb Society forum it is very interesting to hear reports from all over the country of fall-blooming bulbs, Lycoris in the midwest and southern states, Colchicum, autumn Crocus, etc.  Above is the orange Bessera elegans that I had not been able to post before, finding I hadn't kept a photograph of it.  This is the color that is most commonly available in commerce.  Below is Bomarea patacoensis (to the right), and to the left is a Bomarea that I have called B. sp. MG0478. 

A few Crinums are blooming, although by now I am starting to dry them off in preparation for winter.  The one pictured at the left of the first paragraph is Crinum moorei.

Bulb shipping is still going on at a brisk pace.  It seems I get a big rush of orders at this time, although I have been shipping since June.  All of a sudden people start to think 'bulbs', since this is when you would normally be thinking of daffodils and tulips, and they come in from the Netherlands, arriving in the fall for planting.  By the end of October it will be too late to order many bulbs from Telos, since they will start sprouting in storage in response to the cool nights.  I have tried storing them with a little heat to delay them sprouting, but felt it dried them out too much, and decided to just let nature dictate when it is too late to ship.  When shipping is almost over, then the big seed sowing takes place, all the native bulbs and South African bulbs needing to be sown around the time it starts raining here -- October.  The change of pace and change of focus is welcome, giving my work life a rhythm that is synchronous with Nature's cycles.  It is a good feeling.

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Hymenocallis

Hymenocallis is a large genus, with species that come from the southeastern part of the United States, Mexico, Central America, and a few in South America.  They are mostly from regions that get year-round rain, although the Mexican species are from drier habitats.  I have quite a few species, some of which I have not been able to identify.  Their lovely spidery flowers appear for me from June onwards.

To the left is H. eucharidifolia, with broad green leaves and substantial flowers.  It is from Mexico, and grows about 12-18" tall.  It is easy to grow, and can be treated as a houseplant given bright light indoors.  Here, below is a close up of the flower.  I am growing these, and most of the moisture-loving species in plastic wading pools that I fill to about six inches with water, then allow to dry a little between refilling them.

Hymenocallis maximiliani, seen to the left, is a much larger plant, very suitable for the garden in warm climates, where it will form large clumps.  It is from the Mexican state of Guerrero. The flowers are sweetly fragrant, and are produced freely throughout the summer.

There are much smaller versions of Hymenocallis.  H. palmeri, seen to the left, only grows a few inches tall.  These bulbs are growing in a two gallon pot.  The flowers, however, are very large, the petals (tepals) being green and spreading to about five or six inches.  It is commonly known as the 'Alligator Lily', since it is from Florida and grows where alligators are found!  I wouldn't want to try to collect this one.

Another large clumping Hymenocallis is H. littoralis, with elegant spidery flowers.  It is seen here to the left, and comes from Mexico and Guatemala.  It loves heat and moisture, and does well in my greenhouses.

H. harrisiana also comes from Mexico, where it grows in grasslands at elevations up to 6000' .  While the species from Florida and the southeast like wet conditions, usually growing in swamplands or along slowly moving streams, those from Mexico prefer drier conditions.  This is a medium sized plant, with very delicate fragrant flowers.  It is seen here to the right.

H. sonorensis, comes, as you might imagine, from the Mexican state of Sonora.  It has grey leaves that are only about six inches in height, with a flowering stem that is short.  Again the flowers are large, and this species also prefers somewhat drier conditions.  It is seen here to the left.

And last, but not least, is a tiny Hymenocallis that remains unidentified.  It has grey narrow leaves and a rather unique profile, with the cup held above the tepals which are very narrow.  Here it is to the left.

I have about twenty other species, some of which have not yet bloomed.  These are lovely plants, not difficult to grow, with some suited for the garden, others as container plants, and some even suitable as houseplants.  The leaves are attractive, and they are very trouble free as far as pests and disease are concerned.

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