(Pixie Dust X Cym. madidum) 'Salinas Gift'

[GaryCAZ]

This is a stunningly good new tetraploid hybrid that blooms off and on all year around. We already have pods from an August-blooming selection and we were waiting for a very tall, upright-spiked form like this one that a friend has given back to us. These have plenty of WT character and we intend to put some large standards onto this plant also which should give us intermediates in the 3" size range. Did we mention....this spike has 31 blooms.

Andy Easton

[Gary S]

Hi all.

I like this type of flower, but I am biased as I do have a leaning towards hybrids using the 3 Aussie cym's in their parentage. I suppose that comes from not having to go very far to see these naturally occurring in the bush where I live these days.

For example, I can walk from my house about 500 metres to see suave growing quite happily in the forks of gum trees, I need to get in the car and drive maybe 10kms to see madidum and OK I have to drive approx. 200 kms to see the southern form of canaliculatum. These are usually spotted in green to brown tones, but there is the odd pure green around as well as a clear mustard yellow shade.

Regards

Gary..

[MrCym]

Gary,

You are making us all very envious! Have you done any breeding with suave? I find it VERY hard to get it to work as a pollen parent. Always happy to send you some pollen if you want to try something. When you see these plants in the trees are they always out of reach or can you throw a portable stepladder in the van and get right up to them?

[Gary S]

Hi Andy,

Personally I have not done any breeding with suave, but other hobby growers in the Native Orchid society I belong to have had success using it as a pod parent. I think most of them actually take their pollen into the bush when suave is flowering and pollenate the flowers ,hang a tag on the racemes for reference and let the pod develop in situ naturally in the bush. They go back and harvest the pods when ready and take them back to the lab to flask up. All report much higher success rate this way, than using backyard grown suave.

You have to totally replicate the way suave grows naturally to get it to last in the green house at home, it is a bitch to grow for any length of time. The best way seems to be with long terracotta pipe sections (1 yard or more) filled with the rotted or broken down gum tree (eucalypt) inner cores from the stumps of old gum trees. They like long and cool root runs.

Depending in what type of gum trees you see them in (remember we have over 1000 species of gums), some will be at ground level, others in forks 10 feet or so above ground level and others will be high up in the branches out of reach. Most of the ones around here are the browner variety, the clearer green types grow further down the NSW coast from here.

Madidum is usually found higher up in trees , but has been found on the ground. Canaliculatum will grow quite low to the ground even on farm fence posts and the lower growing gum trees in the arid areas of its range.

There is quite a bit of suave around at the moment at various places including on ebay here that has been salvaged from logged hardwood (gum) trees under license in the forests. These have had their roots totally trimmed and the average person will have absolutely no chance of getting these to survive in the greenhouse, they are not cheap either.

This is probably why I like suave in combination with other cyms to make nice hybrids, especially with its 2 Aussie cym sisters - much easier to grow and flower.

Cheers

gary..

[MrCym]

Gary,

This is all very interesting stuff and confirms what I have been told. I did however make one successful hybrid with suave pollen sent by Dr. Miles Seaton and it was a doozy: Val Peck. Now I use Devon Cherry 'NH' 4n as an advanced suave type for breeding and am excited to see its seedlings approach blooming.

[Piya]

It sounds like aloifolium here, they grow naturally on palm tree in paddy field apx 100kms far away from where I live. Also as I recall, there was a big clump of it on a mango tree around grandfarther house when I was a child and I did't know what it is.

Last 4-5 years ago, my mother got a division of aloifolium and put on a tree. It regularly blooms this time of the year and hold many pods. Now, the seedlings of it are becoming weed in my nursery!!

[Gary S]

Andy

Val Peck is a great plant, I have several of them and one that flowered last year had a raceme over 4 feet long.

It was named after the wife of Alan Peck (now deceased) who was one of the instigators in forming the Native Orchid society I belong to on the Central Coast of NSW. I love our speciosum's and kingianum's which grow naturally around here also.

To be honest, I would much rather prefer to see suave in the wild than in the greenhouse, as it just grows much better in the wild. Madidum will grow like a weed at home and canaliculatum does fine as long as it is not watered at all over winter and only really gets steady water in summer and is hung up high under cover. Replicate how it grows naturally in the arid bush where it prefers (dry winter and wet monsoonal type summer)and you will get it to grow well.

Regards

Gary..