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Quote from: Robin Jangle on Yesterday at 11:10:10 PMBirds do not have receptors for capsaicin. Capsicum is distributed by mostly frugivorous birds although opportunists are definitely involved as well.
The seeds of Capsicum are not able to withstand chewing, hence Capsaicin being irritant to mammals - to the point that you will vomit if you consume large quantities thereof.

Humans have no receptor for capsaicin either, as such - the same recptors as detect physical heat also react to capsaicin.

Many, many people become tolerant of capsaicin too. Many moons ago I would eat at an Asian restaurant at least once a week, and often twice, and what I ordered changed over time, although I prefer the actual flavour of chilli to massive heat. There are also lots of chilli eating contests, principally in the US.

Quote from: Arnold on Yesterday at 06:00:40 AMIt's always been a mystery to me how some plant material is toxic to one species and innocuous to other.

Mostly it is just a quirk of genetics, what a digestive, or other system, has evolved with.

Humans are one of the very few animals that can safely eat avocado.
A common wormer for dogs - avamectin, a secretion of some moulds - is toxic to a few breeds (such as dalmatians) as they lack a particular enzyme.
Some protective chemicals in plants are enjoyed by some animals - the characteritic flavours in brassicas are insect repellants.
No snake really wants to kill a human, but unluckily for us, many can hit you with a bite that delivers enough toxins to kill you many times over.
Many caucasians retain an ability to digest lactose into adulthood, but very many races do not - dairy food are not popular in the Far East, and elsewhere.
My father was untroubled by stinging nettles (something that I did not inherit, unfortunately).
Capsaicin is loved by many humans, and you can certainly become progressively immune to it to some degree. It has no effect on many, if not all, birds.

Like most plants with contorted leaves in habitat, that is enhanced by exposure to sun.

My T. t. came into growth in August with tightly folded leaves but growth over the past month or more has been straight.

Turmeric used to be sold in small sachets called something like "Saffie" in the UK - fake saffron.

They taste vastly different, although I like both. For me, turmeric could never be a spice of sweet food, just savoury. I have probably eaten a million times more turmeric than saffron over the years, mostly in huge quantities of pickles (piccalilli).

I have only ever bought La Mancha in the UK and it has always been absolutely fine.

I just checked production figures online, so I'll correct my comment above - Iran produces something like 80% of the world's saffron - somewhere around/in excess of 400 tonnes per year.

(Something like 150 flowers are required to produce one gramme, so 400 tonnes is something like 60 billion flowers (ten zeros))

Spain is third, after India

Quote from: MarkMazer on November 22, 2024, 08:59:28 AM" -it is traditional in cake/bread in Cornwall"
We sometimes include saffron when making a traditional ceremonial Jewish Challah bread.

It will, no doubt, be on the www somewhere, but I could not even begin to guess why it is traditional in Cornwall, which is far too wet to grow it.
The county has traditionally been poor, relying greatly on hard manual labour in mining, fishing, quarrying, agriculture on not great land, for not great wages. (Today it relies heavily on tourism.)

Maybe use of saffron is relatively recent, but you wouldn't think so if you visit.

I love it in anything, so long as it is not drowned by other flavours - it makes the simplest bread or simple sponge cake, or rice, something really special. You also need amazingly little.

It used to be grown in commercail quantities in the UK - hence Saffron Walden.

It is used in beyond countless recipes -it is traditional in cake/bread in Cornwall. Pilau rice usually has it in. Paella too.

Today the big producer is Spain but it is a traditional crop over a great deal of the Middle East, into Asia.

Polystachya is hardy to several degrees of frost - a few people grow it as a garden plant in the UK so long as it is in something like a raised bed so that summer rains drain fast.

The advantage of planting it out is that you can appreciate the flowers more easily - on a greenhouse bench, potted plants produce flowers at around or above eye-level.

Drimia numidica was published by Manning and Goldblatt in 2004, in the Edingurgh Journal of Botany (60:557). The journal is open access.

Edinburgh Journal of Botany

https://journals.rbge.org.uk/ejb/article/view/1105

Interestingly, in view of the comment from @Carlos about it being used as a rodenticide, there are numerous published papers available online looking at the chemicals in the plant, especially phenols.

The latest published review of Veltheimia that I can find is only 5 years old - Manning. That only recognises two species.

Systematics of the genus veltheimia (Hyacinthaceae: Scilloideae)

Quote from: Ron on November 16, 2024, 03:45:56 PMI think rainfall is basically formed from water vapor that coalesces around a bit of airborne debris until the droplet falls.  Except for the debris, it is essentially distilled water at neutral pH. 

The old wives' tale is that the droplets act as lenses and scorch the plants - like schoolboys use (or used to use when I was one) a magnifying glass to either scorch things or set things on fire.

I would suspect that most rain is on the acid side of neutral today given that it will absorb only neutral of acidic gases from the air.

In the UK the vast majority of people will use either rain water from a butt, or tap water for watering. The legal limits for tap water pH here are 6.5 to 9.5.
The only resrevations that I have ever heard of in the UK have related to Proteacae and the various "bog plants" - Sarracenia and the likes. Both should be watered with rain water, although Proteacae cannot utilise ammoniacal nitrogen - they are usually fed with urea.
I don't recall seeing or hearing of water treament for horticultural use, just concerns over quantities. 

Quote from: David Pilling on November 16, 2024, 03:46:38 AMYes, no argument from me now. I was merely pointing out that before this discussion I had a different (incorrect) point of view.

Apologies - misread that/didn't read enough.

Quote from: David Pilling on November 15, 2024, 05:02:24 PMAny virus present. It is common to read that seed grown lily plants are virus free, for example this quote from the RHS lily group:

But many viruses are carried in seeds, and given that no amateur ever knows either if a plant has virus, or if the plant does, which one...................................

You/the RHS has just picked a small section of one of many papers available online about virus transmission via seed. Even the one you quote goes into details about seed transmission.
Just one example -

TRANSMISSION OF VIRUS DISEASES BY SEED,

Neonic's have been banned with very few exceptions, within Europe for several years.

Quote from: David Pilling on November 15, 2024, 01:24:17 PMPropagation by seed does not transmit the virus

What virus?
At least some can be and certainly are. Simple logic and my knowledge of basic biology would suggest that any and all can be.

A watering with epsom salts can do no harm, except that you'll have to buy 168-years'-supply in one go, I suspect.

I thought that the ancient tale about watering/spraying in bright sun had finally been abandoned, but obviously not. If it were true, plants would be laid waste after rain if the sun came out - something very common in the UK at least. I have always thought it was totally illogical and never worried.

As for predatory invertebrates - they need prey to eat. No prey, no predators. No predator completely eliminates prey in real life either.

Going back to my childhood, growing vegetables with my father from the age of not much over 0, I must have grown many tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of plants, many very long term - some here now I know for certain are way over 20 years old and some are probably over 50. Just the Amaryllis comes to mind as likely to be infected with virus.

If I were a commercial grower of sugar beet, or potatoes, or a few other crops that routinely suffer from virus problems...........................................

Fertilisers - I suspect that I am not massively different to many/most in the UK - I use around half strength 15-15-30 mostly, and then either 12.5-25-25 or an even lower N as bulbs start to go dormant.
One popular "universal" fertiliser here in the UK is Miracle-Gro which boasts massive growth and profuse flowers - it is high in both N and K (although there are other formulations under the same brand).

I do not recall ever seeing a soluble fertiliser formulation that did not include numerous trace elements.