This morning I was in the bulb house observing (i.e., gloating over) the Calochorti, and I found that a plant of Calochortus syntrophus has produced a tall stem with numerous buds and also a secondary scape branching off it with more buds. This species had flowered for me at least once in the frames, where I had it in an 8-inch clay pot, but (like most of the other species) it's suddenly much bigger now that it's free-growing. I grew it from seed collected by Ron Ratko at the type site, and I see from the recent book on the genus by Gerritsen and Parsons that a second site has been found 70 km away from the first. I had heard that the type site has been damaged by grazing, so I was wondering how established this species is in cultivation. Are any of you growing it? The authors write that it has been grown from seed but is "reputedly difficult to get to flower." I don't know how difficult that would be, as I never did anything unusual with it; however, it's from northern California and may appreciate the colder winters here in Oregon, as compared with growing it in mild parts of California. I'm also wondering whether Calochortus (Mariposa section) are self-fertile, because only one plant of this species is flowering this year (there are two clones present, but one is resting), and since it's so rare I'd like to hand-pollinate it to get seed. It had set seed for me in the past when both plants flowered, but the seed may have been sired by another of the numerous Mariposa section that bloom around the same time, since there were a great many pollinators at the old garden (very few here in the city). There doesn't seem to be any information in the abovementioned book about fertility. I usually don't want hybridization among my plants, but have to admit that when I look at the remarkable scarlet-orange color of Calochortus kennedyi I wonder what its hybrid offspring might look like! Fortunately, however, there are two clones of it in bloom and I'll cross-pollinate them as soon as the pollen is ready. Jane McGary Portland, Oregon, USA