> On 09/04/2023 11:16 Ralf R Radermacher <fotor...@gmx.de> wrote: > > > Am 09.04.23 um 00:20 schrieb Bill: > > As promised, here is a picture of one of this year's blooms. > > Nice one. > > Are there varieties for different seasons? I've got one which has been > sold to me as a Xmas cactus. > > Ralf > Schlumbergera is a genus of succulent that is, generally, split into two groups for the purposes of domestic house pants. Those generally descendants of the species truncata have yellow pollen, stem segments with pointy edges and flower earlier. Those based on the species russelliana have pink pollen and stems with rounded edges. I list them in the general timings of their flowering. It's not possible to be very precise about all of this because the damned things hybridise as vigorously as orchids, pigeons and doves and all the other organisms famous for the practice.
Flowering is triggered by day length. They need a solid 12 hours a day without light over two weeks at reasonable (16-20degrees C) temperature to cause buds to form. Once formed they are prone to dropping if disturbed. If they get too much light the stems turn bright red. In a previous life, I grew greenhouses full of these things and had to get them ready for market at Christmas time. The best way to trigger flower budding was to cover them with black plastic bags about a week before you wanted them to start. For some reason, nobody wanted to buy them like that. As mentioned, there was no point in selling them once budding had begun, as they would all fall off on the way home or shortly after. -- %(real_name)s Pentax-Discuss Mail List To unsubscribe send an email to pdml-le...@pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
