Australian and New Zealand Gardening: Bromeliads for novices & addicts, October 2012, 1 by splinter1804

splinter1804 wrote:
Hi everyone – When I was sorting out the Nidulariums for re-potting yesterday I found a very large plant which was a NOID. I divided it into five plants and I noticed on the largest one of the five that it has a flower just starting down in the centre, so who knows, I may just be able to get it identified either on this forum or the other two I visit daily.

Ian – Sounds like your visitor could be a very knowledgeable lady and one from whom you can pick up a lot of good tips. Why don't you try and get her interested in our little forum here as I'm sure she'd be well appreciated and we could all share our knowledge and pic's and learn from each other.

It's interesting what she told you about using metho and ammonia to kill scale. Did she by any chance give you the recipe for the mixture. I know that if you get straight metho on a cotton bud and wipe it over scale or mealy bug, it will (in most instances) kill them; but it is an impossible job if you have a large infestation. I also know that ammonia can be used instead of vinegar in the recipe for Rob Smythe's “Canola White Oil Spray”, but this is the first time I've heard of them being used together and like the rest of us, I'd be very interested to learn more about the quantities as any remedy with a low toxicity is good to know about.

Once again we have another Condy's Crystal user. It's strange, but until Mike first mentioned it on this forum, I had never heard of it being used as a fertiliser and this surprises me a bit as I visit various bromeliad forums daily and read a fair bit about bromeliad culture and never before have I read of it being used as a fertiliser and then within about six months we have three people mentioned on this forum alone who are regular users; Mike, yourself and the lady who has just visited you.

You mentioned the “The thumb mark on Ae. Nudicaulis”. This is one of the the main identifying features of this plant, but it also appears on some (not all) Ae. Recurvatas as well. A while back I grew what I believed to be some Ae Nudicaulis seed. I was told (by the “experts”) that Ae. Naudicaulis Aequalis was an habitual “selfer”(When a flower is pollinated by its own pollen or by pollen from another flower of the same plant) and only ever produced seed from it's own self pollination. As I hadn't pollinated it, I believed this to be the case as every flower developed into a seed capsule and so I harvested some of the seed. Because I like this particular plant, the idea of being able to easily multiply my stock was appealing so I went ahead and sowed the seed which grew at a rapid rate. I noticed as the seedlings grew, that the “thumb print” was missing which then started me thinking that it may not have been a “selfing” after all. It wasn't until the first of the plants finally flowered that they were obviously not Ae. Nudicaulis as the upright inflorescence had the bracts of the Nudicaulis but the flowers of an Ae. Gamosepala albeit in different colours. I was quite disappointed in the outcome, but because the flower colour varied, these plants proved to be popular and sold readily on the sales table at our meetings so my seed raising wasn't a complete failure. I ended up keeping just the one as a future conversation piece and because I liked the particular colour, but it just goes to show; you can't always believe “the experts”.

Wendy – I have to agree with you about the Bill. Pyramidalis hybrids, they are quite spectacular, however as with most nice things there is a problem (for me anyway) as these plants are pretty cold sensitive and don't tolerate our winters very well at all and unfortunately the leaves mark very easily.

It's interesting when you say you like the different colours of the Hallelujah. The plant which had been heavily fed was put in the show mainly out of my own curiosity as I liked the different colours as well; however it only got a second place as the judges decided it wasn't a true example (colour wise) of that particular hybrid. It was very surprising though, the amount of questions I was asked about it and most who saw it liked it just as much as the usual coloured plants. I think that Hallelujah is one of the all time great Bill's, and it will be a while yet before it's knocked off is perch.

That's it for today and now a few pic's to finish with, Pic 1 is a mixed group of Bill's, Pic 2 is Bill. 'Medowie Gift', Pic 3 is Bill. 'Pink Champagne', Pic 4 is Guz. 'Hilda' and Pic 5 is Guz 'Sunny Time'.

All the best, Nev.