Scottish Rock Garden Club Forum
Seedy Subjects! => Grow From Seed => Topic started by: johnw on February 23, 2012, 06:17:21 PM
-
Green Mile's Podophyllum difforme seeds are pushing up. I'm elated. ;D
Hopefully I can keep this batch alive. It seems to be a cantankerous species here and with friends in Canada.
johnw - +6c and dreich
-
When I went to visit a friend in Ashburton a month ago, she had a pod on 'Spotty Dotty.' There may be nothing in it of course but it was fat and full-looking. The little non-pods on my own are still hanging there but have nothing in them. Some nice new leaves though. :)
-
Cantankerous indeed, I've given up on it outside, it's too tender. Aaron is able to grow it down in Tennessee, and Yijia succeeds with it in Beijing, but the combination of cold and wet has killed it too many times to count here... It's evergreen inside, or at least the large, lowland Yunnanese form with spotted foliage is, the brownish leaved one from Chen Yi seems slightly more decidous. No luck with the hybrids either, but the last few winters have been unusually bad.
-
Cantankerous indeed, I've given up on it outside, it's too tender. Aaron is able to grow it down in Tennessee, and Yijia succeeds with it in Beijing, but the combination of cold and wet has killed it too many times to count here... It's evergreen inside, or at least the large, lowland Yunnanese form with spotted foliage is, the brownish leaved one from Chen Yi seems slightly more decidous. No luck with the hybrids either, but the last few winters have been unusually bad.
I've killed two and that was indoors. They came up fine, died down suddenly, came up again and said farewell. BTW quite a few of the mariei, delavayi and pleianthum did not die down in the cold room under lights last winter.
johnw
-
When I went to visit a friend in Ashburton a month ago, she had a pod on 'Spotty Dotty.' There may be nothing in it of course but it was fat and full-looking. The little non-pods on my own are still hanging there but have nothing in them. Some nice new leaves though. :)
Then you had best go back and snag that fat pod. ;)
johnw
-
She will send me half of anything eventually harvestable. I have just collected today's mail from the box (at end of road). PM to you in a few minutes. :D
-
I still am growing difforme but I thought I had lost it this spring(september,october).
It has been in a pot for 4 years and it did not come up last spring. All the growth and buds were all on the surface. So i decided to plant them about a month ago and the leaves came up with the rain we just had, like 3 months of rain!!
I did notice when it was in a pot there were 2 flushes of growth Spring and late summer and just in time now its in the ground. See how it does now. Looks larger than ever before but it has never flowered for me.
If its not the cold that kills it, im afraid the heat might do it.
cheer
-
To be honest you're not missing out on much, granted these aren't well-grown, but even if they had been I would imagine them making rather ugly pot subjects...
-
Oh I don't know. Are the leaves a little burnt or malformed at the edges? If planted in the garden maybe they'd be happier do you think?
-
Difforme usually does this. I've even seen it on herbarium specimens, but I doubt it has to look like this. Maybe full slug protection and high, windless humidity is what it wants. I know very little of its habitat, but it responds well during the growing season to excessive, but draining moisture. Maybe, like Diphylliea, it is a creek edge plant or seep plant?
-
A few years ago we had a long discussion on Podophyllum species, specifically the pleianthum-versipelle-mairei (corrected spelling) complex. Robin came to the rescue with a great series of pictures showing the differences with a nice synopsis of defining characteristics.
I discovered on the weekend that P. mairei is not in The Flora of China. Googling P. mairei there were several sites that mentioned that mairei was a synonym for P. aurantiocaule. I wonder what this is based on as the flower of aurantiocaule is white and mairei red. My maireis look nothing like aurantiocaule. Anyone?
Tony – Back in 2009 there was a long thread as we tried to identify our Podophyllums. At the time you posted a shot of your hybrid(Reply 36) listed as #3 – see below.
http://www.srgc.org.uk/forum/index.php?topic=3472.30
It was decided at the time it might be delavayi x versipelle or x pleianthum. I have done these crosses and have never seen one with dissected leaves such as yours. Are its sibling similar?
johnw
-
You've got a typo there, John.... mairei not mariei ;)
From the Kew Plant List:
Podophyllum mairei Gagnep. is a synonym of Dysosma aurantiocaulis (Hand.-Mazz.) Hu
The record derives from Tropicos which reports it as a synonym (record 50273558) with original publication details: Bull. Soc. Bot. France 85: 167 167 1938.
Dysosma aurantiocaulis in Flora of China online:
http://www.efloras.org/florataxon.aspx?flora_id=2&taxon_id=250096284
4. Dysosma aurantiocaulis (Handel-Mazzetti) Hu, Bull. Fan Mem. Inst. Biol., Bot. 8: 37. 1937.
云南八角莲 yun nan ba jiao lian
Podophyllum aurantiocaule Handel-Mazzetti, Anz. Akad. Wiss. Wien, Math.-Naturwiss. Kl. 61: 163. 1924; Dysosma furfuracea S. Y. Bao; D. mairei (Gagnepain) Hiroe; P. aurantiocaule subsp. furfuraceum (S. Y. Bao) J. M. H. Shaw; P. mairei Gagnepain; P. sikkimense R. Chatterjee & Mukerjee; P. sikkimense var. majus R. Chatterjee & Mukerjee.
Plants 30-50 cm tall. Rhizomes brown, short, stout, with numerous fibrous roots. Stems erect, pale stramineous, 3-5 mm in diam., angulate, glabrous. Leaves alternate; petiole of lower leaves 12-22 cm, petiole of upper leaves 3-7 cm, all petioles angulate; leaf blade abaxially pale green, adaxially deep green, suborbicular or reniform in gross outline, sharply diversiform, 7-8 × 13-15 cm, thinly papery, abaxially on veins scurfy squamulate, sometimes mixed pubescent, adaxially glabrous, 5-8-lobed, lobe margin scarcely inconspicuously serrulate. Inflorescence 2-5-fascicled flowers. Pedicel nutant, 3-6 cm, glabrous. Flowers attached far from base of blade, purple or pink. Sepals narrowly oblong, 10-12 × 4-5 mm, glabrous. Petals obovate or suborbicular, 1.4-1.6 × 1-1.2 cm, apex rounded. Stamens ca. 8 mm; filaments flat, shorter than anthers; apex of anther connective not prolonged. Pistil ca. 8 mm; ovary subglobose; style ca. 1 mm; stigma disciform, margin rugosely undulate. Berry pale green (immature), subglobose, ca. 8 mm in diam. Seeds numerous. Fl. May-Jun, fr. Jun-Aug.
● Deciduous broad-leaved forests; 2800-3000 m. Yunnan [?Myanmar].
Shaw (in Stearn, Gen. Epimedium, 299-306. 2002) recognized two subspecies of Podophyllum aurantiocaule, which he separated into subsp. aurantiocaule ("Leaf lobes long, obovate to lanceolate; sinuses deep, penetrating 1/2-2/3 of radius; flowers usually in petiole fork; anthers 5-7.5(-9) mm long") and subsp. furfuraceum ("Leaf lobes short, triangular, sinuses shallow penetrating 1/4-1/3 of radius; flowers borne on petiole; anthers 3.5-4.5 mm").
-
Thanks Maggi - Corrected now.
I see the reference to purple flowers now but I have never seen any colour other than white in pictures.
As for the names I go by what Robin uses: Stearn's spellings:
Podophyllum pleianthum
Podophyllum versipelle
Podophyllum mairei
Podophyllum difforme
Podophyllum delavayi
Podophyllum aurantiocaule subsp furfuraceum
Why Kew and the Flora use different endings for the species would mean hauling down the Latin dictionary and digging out Stearn tonight. PMcD says versipellis, aurantiocaulis and difformis. See above note underlined.
BTW Philip had mentioned awhile back that there was a fellow in Vancouver who appeared at sales with pots and pots of P. difforme. He quizzed him on how he cultivates it and he replied that difforme was growing like mad in his garden and did nothing special, he had plenty of spares. Unfortunately they mysteriously collapsed (as they do for the rest of us here) last year and he lost the lot. :'(
johnw
-
Great to go back and have another look at the 2009 thread, so many super plants there. And I always enjoy seeing again, Susan's avatar picture. That is one happy dog! ;D
-
This Podophyllum versipelle is a bit of a mysterious thing. For awhile it bore flowers in the fork but as it matured they appeared at the base of the leaf as they should. Today I noticed a two year old pleianthum x versipelle seedling with a small cluster of flowers up at the base of the leaf. ::)
johnw
-
Tony's # 3 in the old post linked to above is majoense. It matches the type in every respect. The petals are shorter and rounded rather than elongate and lanceolate. Otherwise it looks like delavayi.
Pleianthum should have its flower positioned at the junction of the petioles and versipelle and mairei at the base of a leaf on the petiole.
Mairei is a good species! Not sure what Ying et al. were doing in the FOC. I can agree with them on the 3 Shaw species though. The types are not distinctive enough to deserve names.
I'll take some photos later of mine which are in flower now.
-
Tony's # 3 in the old post linked to above is majoense. It matches the type in every respect. The petals are shorter and rounded rather than elongate and lanceolate. Otherwise it looks like delavayi.
Pleianthum should have its flower positioned at the junction of the petioles and versipelle and mairei at the base of a leaf on the petiole.
Mairei is a good species! Not sure what Ying et al. were doing in the FOC. I can agree with them on the 3 Shaw species though. The types are not distinctive enough to deserve names.
I'll take some photos later of mine which are in flower now.
This is the link to Tony's pix
http://www.srgc.org.uk/forum/index.php?topic=3472.msg94913#msg94913
-
Aaron - Looking forward to your pictures. Then we will sort out our delavayis from our majoenses!
Do you have luck with difforme?
I was speaking to a Scottish friend who claims most Podophyllums come up too early and get frosted. P. aurantiocaule is fine though. In my seedlings I see a great range of emergence times - some pleianthums, delavayis and maireis are just now peeping out, well behind the others by 2-3 weeks. I suggested he try growing more seed.
johnw
-
Interesting comment on my number 3 which is in fact one of 100+ seedlings I raised from seed using my delavayi plants as seed parent and is not a wild plant. They are growing mixed with versipelle ,mairei etc and although I worked at the pollination so did the insects.
John as to frost damage my delavayi in the open garden were frosted of last week whilst those under shrubs were okay. They are recovering. The versipelle alongside them were unaffected.
Also the time appearing above ground for them all is very variable. Some are in full leaf and others just an inch high. I did wonder if it was due to the amount of water available as we have just had two weeks without rain and those in the drier areas are behind the wetter ones.
-
Interesting comment on my number 3 which is in fact one of 100+ seedlings I raised from seed using my delavayi plants as seed parent and is not a wild plant. They are growing mixed with versipelle ,mairei etc and although I worked at the pollination so did the insects.
John as to frost damage my delavayi in the open garden were frosted of last week whilst those under shrubs were okay. They are recovering. The versipelle alongside them were unaffected.
Also the time appearing above ground for them all is very variable. Some are in full leaf and others just an inch high. I did wonder if it was due to the amount of water available as we have just had two weeks without rain and those in the drier areas are behind the wetter ones.
Tony - I will keep an eye out for flower buds on my delavayi x versipelles and post if there any. As mentioned before none are so dissected as the one you showed, all pretty much the same with varying bronziness.
Sorry to hear about your delavayis but good to know there is some genetics there to select for late risers. Dry here as well but the potted late ones have received the same treatment as the early ones.
Were several weeks ahead of normal and the early rhodos and magnolias are fantastic.
johnw - +16c
-
I have grown for five or six years Dysosma difformis in pot, kept in winter in an almost frost free polytunnel (-3° to -5° minimum). This winter, I placed it in an unheated tunnel and it has frozen with all its fellows :'(
-
I did wonder if it was due to the amount of water available as we have just had two weeks without rain and those in the drier areas are behind the wetter ones.
That would explain why mine are not yet through I hope :D
-
To determine if majoense is a good species one would need good wild material and the hybrid that looks like it (or is it) and find a genetic marker that works for the species. As far as I know there is no good phylogenetic work on Podophyllum using more than one or two clones or even all the species known.
Some pic's of mine in the garden. I excluded my early versipelle that is a runner because it came up in March got frozen, sprouted again and got frozen and then put up a dozen or so leaves in early April. Difforme is excluded as well; they all went into pots last summer to get them to maturity. I don't have all the others. Emodii is difficult for me. It must be a high elevation plant, or the clones I've grown (killed) are all Himalayan and not Chinese. I now have some vigorous seedlings of a Sichuan form.
1,2 P. aurantiocaule ex Vietnam (doubtful, but who knows?)
3 P. delavayi
4 P. mairei -- short petals crowded just below the leaf
5 P. peltatum - my variegated form, stable and better as it ages
6, 7 P. pleianthum -- ex Heronswood, ex Seneca Hills (originally from Crug?)
8 P. versipelle clone, variegated, but makes no rhizomes, strictly clumping
9 P. versipelle, a runner, but glabrous beneath and one pedicels
-
Aaron - Thanks for the pix, we await flowers here.
I hope you have luck with the Sichuan form of emodi. We seem to have over-looked the beauty of P. emodi here the last few years with the influx of new species. It is a brute to 1 meter tall or more and we seem to have no problems here with it whatever the source. Of course heat and humidity are not a problem here. I have also seen wonderful plants in eastern Newfoundland as well.
A few pix from last year.
johnw - drizzle & +9c
-
I was pleased to see that mine are just poking through the grit now, phew!
-
I was pleased to see that mine are just poking through the grit now, phew!
Brian - At least it has the good sense to stay underground till any cold passes.
johnw
-
Flowering time here on many Podophyllums, here is P. pleianthum.
johnw
-
Tony - In my post #19 I promised you pix of delavayi x versipelle.
First here is one I got as delavayi x versipelle from Philip McD. He was here last week and says now the cross was in fact delavayi x pleianthum.
Two shots of that one.
johnw
-
And here 3 pix of my cross of delavayi x versipelle. Quite different - stigma length, petal width/stance and anther shape.
johnw