Hardy Crinums. Was: Whats blooming in New York :) (Crinum x powellii)

J.E. Shields jshields@indy.net
Sat, 28 Aug 2010 10:05:58 PDT
My Crinum x-powellii roseum form are still here, but Jim McK is right about 
a strong back to excavate a clump out of the ground.  I leave that to my 
hired staff, now all gone off to school again for the winter.

As Ellen mentions, x-powellii album is a much nicer garden plant than 
x-powellii roseum.

Nicer than any of the x-powellii as garden plants are Crinum bulbispermum 
and C. variabile.  Both are hardy here once the bulbs reach about 2 inches 
in diameter.  Plant them at least 8 inches deep and mulch heavily the first 
couple of winters.  After that, they'll do just fine in USDA zone 5 and 
warmer.  I have a few volunteer seedlings of some crinum coming up in one 
bed out in the open.  I assume they are C. bulbispermum; this seems to 
violate my 2-inch rule.

Following the 2-inch rule, other hardy crinums are C. [bulbispermum x 
lugardiae] and [variabile x bulbispermum].  Some C. [macowanii x 
bulbispermum]  are hardy here in the ground, but only about 1 out of three 
plants in the cross I tested a few years ago.  Some [bulbispermum x 
graminicola] also survived outdoors in the ground for a couple of winters 
before I turned chicken and potted them up again.  They still have not bloomed.

(Note:  I may have the pollen parents and the seed parents reversed in some 
of those crosses I listed.)

Jim Shields
in beautiful, mild Westfield Indiana,
where the heat is soon going to ratchet rapidly back up above 90F/32C


At 12:25 PM 8/28/2010 -0400, you wrote:
>Ellen wrote of Crinum x powellii: "I excavated my pink ones last year and
>discarded them - far too much leaf for the flower power..."

*************************************************
Jim Shields             USDA Zone 5             Shields Gardens, Ltd.
P.O. Box 92              WWW:    http://www.shieldsgardens.com/
Westfield, Indiana 46074, USA
Tel. ++1-317-867-3344     or      toll-free 1-866-449-3344 in USA


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