Hardiness of Haemanthus
J.E. Shields (Thu, 04 Aug 2005 13:01:19 PDT)
Hi Jim,
Thanks for your comments. The multiflorus of commerce is Scadoxus
multiflorus multiflorus. The Scadoxus are rather different from the
Haemanthus in plant structure as well as in DNA.
Scadoxus multiflorus multiflorus grows outdoors in the ground and blooms in
the deep South, along the Gulf Coast, as far as I know. Haemanthus
albiflos is a hardy garden plant in Southern California. I've heard that
Haemanthus coccineus can take "a lot of frost," but I'm not sure just what
that translates into as degrees, hours, and days.
Haemanthus humilis hirsutus is native to the High Veld while H. humilis
humilis is found in the Eastern Cape and Free State provinces (the two
subspecies appear to overlap somewhat in range.) H. montanus occurs at
1000 m (ca. 3300 ft.) elevation and above in Eastern Cape, Free State,
KwaZulu-Natal provinces, and parts of the high veld, probably present-day
Mpumalanga province. I would like to breed montanus with some of the
others from colder locations, and test the hybrids for frost tolerance
here. This project is not coming along very well!
Regards,
Jim Shields
in central Indiana (USA)
At 02:57 PM 8/4/2005 -0400, you wrote:
Jim, I can't answer your question the way you asked it, but I can tell you
that Haemanthus multiflorus of horticulture has been known to survive a
winter outside here against a wall.
What "against a wall" means varies from year to year, but in a typical
winter, plants underground and against a wall evidently do not experience
freezing temperatures. They are also in the rain shadow of the house, so
they are relatively dry. I've never known plants wintered outside to bloom,
however.
In my experience, just about anything which is winter dormant and does not
have live foliage above ground can be wintered outside this way.
Jim McKenney
Montgomery County, Maryland, USA, USDA zone 7, except within five inches of
a south-facing wall where it is (below ground at least) zone 9 or 10.
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