Nerine--TOW
Mary Sue Ittner (Fri, 02 May 2003 07:53:30 PDT)

Dear All,

For Alberto I looked for the notes about fertilizing from Sir Peter who
grew and hybridized thousands of Nerine sarniensis and found the following
two quotes:

"N. sarniensis and its hybrids must have a cool winter with plenty of
water, particularly in the first half of their growing season when they are
making their foliage. Temperatures above about 13C except in direct
sunlight have been found by the New Zealand researchers to be unfavourable
to leaf and bulb growth and this was confirmed by my own experience. I
dare say that
N. bowdenii will take a good deal of fertiliser. With the species I would
go cautiously. With N. sarniensis very cautiously indeed. They pumped
the plants up with feeding in New Zealand and I believe the immediate
results were spectacular followed by devastating virus attacks later on."

This second quote was specific to N. sarniensis hybrids
"6. Pests and diseases. Heavy fertilisation releases the virus which is
dormant in these plants. As I did not fertilise at all, I only once or
twice saw virus in any of some thousands of plants. Research in the wild
showed that these plants grow in nature in some of the world's poorest
soils. Attempts to push them for rapid maturity from seed or cuttage and
largest size flower heads or two spikes per bulb resulted in the near
collapse of one large commercial operation from virus. I only once lost a
bulb from insect attack when mealybug somehow got inside a bulb and my
efforts to destroy it destroyed the bulb as well! Insects are not a
problem with these plants. My greenhouse would never have passed a
phytosanitary inspecton because it was also used for certain things
compatible with the Nerines, i.e. a winter store for Citrus: Passiflora
edulis, Hoya and some scandent Epiphyllums which housed several enemies
which did not trouble the Nerines."

Sir Peter Smithers

All of the contributions have been so interesting and helpful. There
appears to be a lot of variation in how these are grown.

The Nerine filifolia on the Wiki from Bill Dijk looks very different from
the ones from Rhoda and Cameron. Could it be something else and if so what?
It is really nice whatever it is.

One of the advantages we have with our wiki is that we have such a lot of
knowledgeable people in our group. If there are mistakes I hope everyone
will speak up because we want what we are presenting to be accurate as
people are finding the wiki pages by searching with Google.

Mary Sue