Hesperoxiphion peruvianum

Mary Sue Ittner msittner@mcn.org
Sat, 10 Aug 2002 07:30:02 PDT
Dear Lyn,

 From my saved IBS forum files, I will post this message from Sir Peter 
Smithers about this plant. My saved files also include some great 
information from Bill Richardson and from Dirk, but since they are members 
of this group they may want to comment themselves. However, if they are 
willing I can just repost their messages from the past if some of you are 
interested. Also I wonder if it would be worth my time to scan the Eric 
Walton article and put it in word format so I could send it as an 
attachment to those people who might be interested. Perhaps people could 
write me privately at mailto:msittner@mcn.org
If there aren't many it would seem easier just to make copies for those 
interested. Bill, didn't you have pictures of this one on the IBS gallery 
of bulbs? When mine bloomed briefly, I thought it quite amazing.

Mary Sue

First post:
"Eric Walton kindly send me a corm of this last year and it grew and
flowered excellently.    A real eccentric, it grew a long branching
inflorescence to about three feet and opened a succession of flowers, large
and elegant but lasting only for the morning.   It multiplied at the root
and I now have a potful."

a year later

"One remarkable thing has happened in my garden.    The flowering of 
Hesperoxiphion peruviana.   My records tell me that seeds came from one of 
us, 'Walton', in 1997 but that, probably due to my incompetence, only one 
plant resulted which flowered last year.   Since then it has multiplied in 
an extraordinary fashion and this year has put on an arresting display in a 
big pot full of bulbs for two months nonstop.    True the splendid 
orange-yellow flowers fade after 1 p.m. and they tend to display every 
second day.    But while the display is on it is
most elegant.    About fifteen of the flowers every second day, carried 
with great elegance  and poise on long stems.    As the stems are very 
slender and the leaves rudimentary, the flowers seem to be floating in the 
air.   This show goes on without interruption provided that the seed pods 
are nipped off as soon as the flowers close.

Peter "




More information about the pbs mailing list