Dear All, I have started a wiki page with information from Julian's introduction and have added a few pictures. Paul Tyerman shared some of his and we had a couple. Hopefully some of the rest of you will have some to add as well. http://pacificbulbsociety.org/pbswiki/index.php/… When we were in South Africa we saw what we thought of as Albuca a lot although some of them could have been Ornithogalum. Since it wasn't something I grew much of and they weren't always in our field guides I didn't attempt to figure them out. But they seemed to be widespread in the Cape. The most interesting habitat we saw was in Clanwilliam where we saw them growing (and blooming) in the gutters on a roof (obviously not needing depth.) I have one surviving Albuca nelsonii I planted in the ground where it gets a lot of water in winter and not as much in summer. We water it, but I suspect the redwood roots suck up the water we add. It has only bloomed once for me and unfortunately I didn't get a picture of it them. I remember people writing very positively about it on the old IBS list a number of years ago. Since it is a summer rainfall species it probably doesn't like my Mediterranean climate. I have found that Albuca grown from seed doesn't always go dormant that first year and have been unsure what to do with it. Should you continue to water it or force a dormancy? One I kept going when it did finally go dormant, stayed dormant although the bulbs are still alive. Sometimes the same thing happens for Ornithogalum so any advice on this would be appreciated. When I received a lot of Albuca seeds from a BX I tried floating some and they did germinate that way, but I ended up with more survivors sowing in my usual way. Are people who are fans of Galanthus also fans of Albuca? Many of them look alike. One wonders what relationship dna will show them to have. Finally I scanned in these pictures from my slides of our trip to South Africa and before I put them on a wiki page wonder if anyone could help me confirm identification of them? If they are in doubt I may just take them off later. This picture was taken at Springbok in Namaqualand on a wet day and there weren't flowers, but I am wondering it the leaves could have belonged to Albuca spiralis. Hope I didn't make this too long so it won't wrap? I didn't want to title it as the sure thing. http://pacificbulbsociety.org/pbswiki/files/… This one was taken between Citrusel and Clanwilliam and isn't in the field guide for the area, but maybe is just A. flaccida? http://pacificbulbsociety.org/pbswiki/files/… These last two are of the same plant and I originally thought it was an Albuca, but now I am wondering if it could have been an Ornithogalum? Found near the West Coast blooming September 2001. http://pacificbulbsociety.org/pbswiki/files/… http://pacificbulbsociety.org/pbswiki/files/… Thanks for any help. Mary Sue
