On Dec 19, 2004, at 3:48 PM, Alberto Castillo wrote: > Dear Matt, Mary Sue, Lee: > Of course these Phycellas look so alike Cyrtanthus!! They are > Cyrtanthi and not Phycella at all!!! I think it was Cathy who sent an > image of a fine bouquet of Rhodophialas in several colors that were > sold as Phycella by the Dutch last year. > Best > > Alberto > > Sorry, I haven't had time to write before now. I thought I had forwarded Alberto's determination that those were Cyrtanthus hybrids of some kind back when I uploaded that photo. Maybe I planned on doing so and never got around to it but thought I had. When I saw Matt's photos, they looked just like the purported "Phycella" of mine (which by the way is now reblooming even thought we had quite the unseasonably chilly weather for this area for a couple of weeks recently. (Now we're having this really nice unseasonably warm weather in the upper 70s/lower 80s (mid-20's C.).) What's weird is that the photo I uploaded of the Cyrtanthus elatus hybrid I got at that IBS symposium Matt mentioned looks quite different. For one thing, the flowers are much smaller. The "Phycella" Cyrtanthus are about the size of C. falcatus flowers. The photo Alberto referred to above is the picture that was used in the catalog that I ordered from. So even though they used false advertising both in print and in picture, the bulbs I got are quite nice nevertheless. (Although I still would love to get my hands on some Phycella bulbs...or even the Rhodophialas in the photograph!) --Lee Poulsen Pasadena area, California, USDA Zone 9-10