Columnea 'Orange Beauty', Sinningia 'Diva', S. sellovii, Seemannia sylvatica, Petunia exserta and more

An oldie but a goodie. Columnea 'Orange Beauty' hybridized by Cornell in the early 1960's.

A pretty flower and a nice clear light orange.

 Sinningia 'SRG's Pyou'. A very pretty Sinningia that is easy to grow and have nice contrast between the magenta flowers an darker leaves.

 Seemannia sylvatica. No matter what I do to this thing, it's hard to keep from getting brown leaves. I'm doing something very wrong but I'm not sure what. It does need to be moist and not dry out. After that????

 Sinningia 'Diva'. This one is very cool and I am a big fan of the double calyx flowers. It seems to grow a good size tuber too.

 Sinningia 'Prudence Risley'. Just go order one of these. They are that good. Never out of bloom and they will take an immense amount of abuse. Logee's offers them now as well as Rob's and Kartuz.

 Sinningia sellovii. This thing will be interesting to put outdoors. One of them seeded into the neighboring pots and of all the things that will grow, almost guarnteed, this one will. If you want a species Sinningia... how about this one. It's big and it might really do well outdoors.

One of the rarest of the rare. Petunia exserta. Only one group was found in the wild but seeds were distributed. This is a very fun and interesting plant. It takes a while from seeding to get it going robustly, but after that... it's a great grower and bloomer even under lights.

The leaves are super sticky and will catch fungus gnats all by itself. Sort of like a Butterwort only on a Petunia.

Questions??
Comments???

Seemannia sylvatica Up Close and Personal

Here are a couple of the flowers off of a Seemannia sylvatica plant.

Trying to get the flower cut off from the plant bumped it just enough to tear open part of the pollen sacs and spill some of the pollen.

If you look at the rim of the flower the dark dots aren't flat and simply pigment, they are

raised little structures that seem to exude a sticky substance. Does it attract insects, or help stick pollen to either itself of others?

Along with the raised structures from the photo above, there are chunks of pollen (the lighter yellow stuff) all over from when the pollen sac burst. Note how cool the 'hairs' on the flower are. They are sort of a translucent pink like the flower's petals.

Here's another look at the pollen sacs.














This is a different older flower that was cut open. A surprise was inside. There is all sorts of gray mold of some sort growing there in strands.

The raised structures similar to the first couple of photos are now withering and declining like the rest of this older flower.

The pistal has just a small amount of pollen on it.

I tried to break open another of the pollen sacs to see more of the pollen. It comes out in sort of fluffy chunks and seems to spread all over pretty easily. It's the lighter white/yellow dusty stuff on the red and yellow flower petals.

And this shot is an overall view of the flower's interior with the top parts of the petals cut away for easier viewing of the reproductive structures.

Gesneriad flowers frequently are quite fuzzy and hairy. More photos of that to come!

Comments????

Seemannia sylvatica - now in a store near you!

 Look at what awesome plant was just sitting on display waiting to be purchased at Linder's Greenhouse in St. Paul???

This is a Seemannia sylvatica 'Bolivian Sunset', which was formerly called Gloxinia sylvatica (which is on it's current label that it's marked with at the store.)

Text taken from the outstanding website owned by Ron Myhr, the Gesneriad Reference Web:

"The species in the genus Seemannia were formerly placed in Gloxinia until a revision of the group in 2005.  The revision resulted in a number of other changes to the rhizomatous Gesneriads, in addition to the transfer of these species to Seemannia. 

Seemannia is comprised of four species with primarily red or reddish tubular flowers.  While similarities in appearance do not always indicate close relatedness, genetic analysis in this instance suggests that the morphological similarities do in fact reflect underlying relatedness.

Seemannia is primarily an Andean genus, distributed through Bolivia, northern Argentina and southern Peru.  S. sylvatica is known as far north as southern Ecuador.

The most widely grown of this group is S. sylvatica, which has also contributed to a number of hybrids.  This is a variable species.

All members of Seemannia have rhizomatous storage structures at the root, and typically die back seasonally, usually in response to drought, before re-sprouting when more favorable weather arrives.  They are therefore easily propagated from rhizomes, and can also be easily propagated from tip cuttings.  Under some circumstances, these plants will produce long stringy/wiry aerial propagules, which can also be planted to produce additional plants."

Hope you enjoyed the Gesneriad Reference Web's site, it's owned and maintained by Ron Myhr.

There are quite a few great looking plants at the store currently and some unusual gesneriads such as Aeschynanthus
 that are not simply 'Lipstick plants', Episcias, lovely S. speciosa and perhaps a Codonanthe vine (which I've never seen on sale commercially before.)