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Platycerium from spores


Karsty

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You could sell the divisions on here (or give them away if you wish!), or on eBay, I'm sure you could get a reasonable price for them as it is so rarely offered.

Here is the Platycerium superbum, all 95cm of it from top to bottom - 

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https://photos.app.goo.gl/kRfT3F2sgNdDhZn12

 

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https://photos.app.goo.gl/S9H4XiHbm8gLMMs62

 

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https://photos.app.goo.gl/0CU9AOA4yJ0bkiXY2

 

And here is the developing spore patch, amazing! -

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https://photos.app.goo.gl/EHIaGzd7QBNYVBTU2

Edited by Karsty
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Brilliant! You will have to move house when it grows bigger :yes: There used to  be a huge plant of superbum growing in the old tropical house at Kew, I remember it well from my first visit there many years ago. I dont know if it lives in the new glasshouses since built, it's a good many years since I visited last.

 

Here is my P Lemoinei (supposedly a cultivar of veitchii, or a hybrid between willinckii and veitchii depending on which account you read. It certainly looks much more like veitchii than anything else:

 

 

IMG_1004.JPG

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Thanks for posting the photo Ali! It's a beauty! It looks very drought tolerant. Also interesting to glimpse the other beings in your greenhouse :tu: (I've also been growing cacti and succulents for about 40 years) Does it ever produce spores?

(What's the Tillandsia in the photo?)

I went to Kew Gardens this year in May. Honestly, it was a bit disappointing in the Princess of Wales Conservatory. A lot (not all) of plants looked a bit manky and underfed, including Dicksonia and Platycerium, and there were no Nepenthes anywhere.

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Yes it certainly produces sporangia although I have never tried collecting the spores. Most accounts seem to view it as a veitchii cultivar , if so it should come true from spores. It has a very plastic morphology, you have to grow it in full sun and keep it dry to get the vertical fertile fronds and the frills on the sterile ones.
The Tilly is T. myosura, quite easily grown, and tends to seed itself around


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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Well heres a couple of photos taken with my phone camera down the eyepiece of my microscope!

As you can see the sporangia are very dark brown and the spores (a few visible almost in the centre of the second picture) are pale straw coloured.

Interestingly not very many sporangia with ripe spores, which may be because it is a hybrid (hybrids typically produce lots of small white spores and a few large typical spores, or none at all), or maybe just drought at the time of formation...Like your superbum, mine is now producing the spore patches on the fronds that will give next years sporangia.

IMG_1007.JPG

IMG_1008.JPG

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Just been looking at my spore collection in the fridge, I have about 25 different packets, some of which are over 20 years old, I think I will grow them all out next year to see whether they are viable ( I have grown Pityrogramma from 11 year old refrigerated spores a couple of times in the last 20 or so years!)

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Good luck with that! It might be worth noting the ages of the spores that germinate, that could be useful info.

I still have no growth at all from the P. bifurcatum x willinckii, P. coronarium Philippense Dwarf form, P. hillii, and P. veitchii that I sowed on the moss peat. My best guess is this implies simply very few ripe or viable spores from them. I will try sowing the entire remaining contents of the packets, in the hope that there are a few good spores in the mix.

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  • 3 months later...
  • 2 months later...

Karsty, I looked up Platycerium quadridichotomum and checked the climate where it originates. They get less rain than we do in the wet season, but just about the same as we get in the dry season, ie. virtually zero. We're a little bit warmer but not by much. Seems like a very good candidate as a Platycerium for our climate. Only thing is I've never heard of it or its spores being available here or elsewhere.

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57 minutes ago, tropicbreeze said:

Karsty, I looked up Platycerium quadridichotomum and checked the climate where it originates. They get less rain than we do in the wet season, but just about the same as we get in the dry season, ie. virtually zero. We're a little bit warmer but not by much. Seems like a very good candidate as a Platycerium for our climate. Only thing is I've never heard of it or its spores being available here or elsewhere.

Yep, it's like looking for hen's teeth. But there are some countries where it might just be available. This might be a good place to start - https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100006887947758 . They do export, and can provide phyto certificate. I know at least one person in Germany who ordered from them and was very happy with what he got. Other than that, if you just do a facebook search for it, you might just get lucky!

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