Dear All, I asked Dave Lehmiller who is an expert on Crinum but not a member of this list if he could help with any of the Crinum photos or the questions that came up a few weeks ago. He has written me back and given me permission to share his comments with the Crinum enthusiasts on the list. So here they are: "I scanned the Crinum photos and the discussions for January that you listed. Regarding identity of Crinum, a cultivated bulb of unknown origin is almost impossible to accurately identify from a photo. A photo of just an inflorescence in such a situation is next to worthless. Cultivation introduces many artifacts: stunting with smaller umbels and disproportionate changes in floral parts when grown in small pots, larger umbels than occur in nature if grown in optimal conditions, loss of undulations in leaves if overwatered, color changes dues to sunlight and temperature, etc. Then regarding a species, the identity encompasses fruit and seeds which are very important diagnostic features, as well as the arrangement and structure and composition of the leaves, the movement of buds prior to anthesis, the shape and coats of the bulb, the chromosome count, etc. -- and now even the DNA content is becoming important. Photos of florescences in decline are of no value either. Photos ought to be pristine, taken shortly after sun rise, before flowers begin to droop, and a sequence to show bud motion might help. Just distinguishing a hybrid from a species is problematic, because hybrid backcrosses can appear very similar to one of the original species -- and seed production is not a reliable indicator, because many backcrosses are seed fertile. Some hybrids can resemble other species. Many complex hybrids are also seed fertile, and some are very good at reproducing offspring similar to the parent complex hybrid. And if the unknown bulb is a hybrid, then all bets are off -- there are many hybrids that appear similar, yet the parent species can be widely divergent. Now photos of a species in habitat are an entirely different matter. These can often be accurately identified from photos, especially if the flora of the locality has been studied, and especially if the photos include fruit. Species bulb obtained from a specific locality and then cultivated and photographed can often be identified too, but even this can sometimes be a little tricky if the person performing the identity doesn't have field experience in the locality. Many bulbs sold in the past as species weren't true species (various hybrid backcrosses, double backcrosses, etc.). Many reported hybrids involving parentage in the past were really just guesses involving the parentage -- open pollination in gardens, where there was simultaneous pollination by moths at night. Many species introduced into cultivation were misidentified; i.e., there are multiple references to C.kirkii in cultivation in the USA from 1900 thru 1965, yet I am certain that it was never introduced because none of the bulbs described ever produced seeds (and because it is not a desirable bulb; its flowers droop long before sunrise in warm climates). And many hybrids which pass thru one hand and then another end up being misidentified. Multiple times people have sent me "species" bulbs that turned out to be hybrids, and several times they sent me "new" species bulbs that actually were just bulbs that had been introduced into a locality from another part of the world. A couple of other comments from the January list: 1) The article on Burbank's White Queen with photos is in Herbertia 39:66-78, 1983. Hannibal marketed a bulb labeled "White Queen" which wasn't Burbank's White Queen; i.e., an impostor. 2) No one knows what encompasses C. scabrum. It was originally published as a bulb originating from Brazil, which is impossible since no Subgenus Codonocrinum bulbs are indigenous to South American. It is a very confused bulb in horticulture circles; i.e., a grab bag of different bulbs. 3) Crinum mosaic potyvirus: First reported in Australia in 1978 (Pares & Bertus, Phytopath. Z. 91:170). Spread to Fiji in 1980 (Brunt, A.A. UNDP/FAO Survey in Fiji). Probably the same virus that has decimated various Crinum collections in Hawaii. Beware bulbs having originated from Hawaii. 4) I am amazed at some of the erroneous identities given to certain photos on various Website. Regards, Dave Lehmiller