What is a bulb?

Alberto Castillo ezeizabotgard@hotmail.com
Mon, 07 May 2012 06:39:28 PDT

No harm in discussing any interesting plant provided OUT OF TOPIC is added to it. If the PBS definition permits the inclusion of orchids with pseudobulbs then it has to be revised. They are common herbaceous perennials like Achilleas or Tradescantias and most do not even shed their foliage. What do they have to do with bulbs, corms and tubers, horticulturally? There is a good number of orchids that are "bulbs" like Bletilla, Dactylorhiza, Orchis, Ophrys, Serapias and hundreds of Australian Diuris, Corybas, Pterostylis and the like. 

Here in South America we have many woody plants that naturally grow with part of the trunk buried in the ground. This is a mechanism to cope with fires as the new growth sprouts from this protected buried portion. They qualify as geophytes, i. e. bulbs if we keep on splitting hairs.

My question is, are there so few bulbs that we must include plants that only dragged by the hairs could belong in the world's most important bulb society?


 		 	   		  



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