East LondonEast London - Bromeliad Newsletters...Paradise Point. • GENERAL – BSI66 Fund update...
Transcript of East LondonEast London - Bromeliad Newsletters...Paradise Point. • GENERAL – BSI66 Fund update...
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East London Bromeliad Society South Africa October 2017 Page 1
Our aim is to promote and encourage awareness and interest in Our aim is to promote and encourage awareness and interest in Our aim is to promote and encourage awareness and interest in Our aim is to promote and encourage awareness and interest in Bromeliads in East London and all of South Africa!Bromeliads in East London and all of South Africa!Bromeliads in East London and all of South Africa!Bromeliads in East London and all of South Africa!
A really super, relaxed, informative and well
attended September meeting was held on
a lovely Spring day at the home of Dr Boots
and Alison Horsfall in Vincent Heights with
their lovely sprawling gardens. A perfect
venue for the meeting and for our guest
speaker, Christo van Wijk, one of our country
members from Pretoria, to present his talk on
Hybridising, Culling and Registering
Bromeliads. Thank you Boots for providing all
the equipment necessary so that Christo
could just plug in his flash stick and go! You
just have to love technology! And thanks to
Alison for the innovative screen, which
worked extremely well and both of you for your warm and welcoming hospitality. Boots is fairly new to
collecting bromeliads and he has amassed a lovely collection so far. Most were arranged in the front garden
under a huge fig tree which will provide some shelter from our soon to be blazing hot sun! His Tillandsia
collection is mounted on a trellis on the patio wall on the other side of the house. I can see it’s not going to
end there, more coming soon!
Our speaker for the meeting was Christo van Wijk who arrived from Pretoria with his partner Willie du Plessis on
Sunday morning. Lyn fetched them from the airport and brought them to the meeting. Dr Peter Pfister hosted
them for their two night stay in East London and Pete squeezed in a visit to Bonza Bay Beach for Willie and on
Monday they also visited, besides Lyn and Pete’s gardens, the gardens of Dudley Reynolds, Barbara and
Eddie Black and Brenda Wegner. When I asked how he got interested in broms: “I was given an Aechmea
fasciata by my Grandma when I was in hospital with a broken leg as a young
teenager, on being told that I must keep the cup filled with water I was
fascinated…… the bug bit” and he had to find
out more about this amazing looking plant.
Christo started collecting from anyone he knew
had bromeliads, his friends moms etc. and most
of us know how brom crazy he is today. Thanks
for sharing your bromeliad knowledge and
experiences with all of us Christo!
Hybridising, Culling and
Reg is te r ing B romel iads
presented by Christo van Wijk
• It all starts with a dream…..
• Choose the plants you want to hybridise: The
seed parent usually carries the shape, and/or
ELBS is an Affiliated Society of Bromeliad Society International
East LondonEast LondonEast LondonEast London Bromeliad Society
South Africa Established: 25 July 2009
NEWS LETTER
October 2017
Dr Boots and Alison Horsfall and part of his growing collection of super bromeliads.
Christo van Wijk and Willie du Plessis.
Right, Neoregelia ‘Leopard Queen’ and
Neoregelia ‘Milagro’ (albomarginated).
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East London Bromeliad Society South Africa October 2017 Page 2
variegation pattern, the pollen parent usually carries
size, spines and growth habit. An albomarginated
(white on the leaf edge) Neoregelia can usually not
be used as a seed parent. As in this case I would use
Neoregelia ‘Milagro’ as a pollen parent
(albomarginated) and Neoregelia ‘Leopard Queen’
as the seed parent.
• Remove the pollen from both parents at around
7am when the flower buds have just opened. Keep
the pollen you want to use, and discard the rest.
There will be 2 stems of pollen (stamens) attached to
each flower petal, they can easily be pulled off with
some tweezers, and it can be placed on a clean
sheet of paper to dry.
• The pollen can be stored for up to 2 years in a clean
container with some dry rice or silica gel added,
store the container in the fridge. Label Clearly.
• Pollen is then removed, showing the stigma in the
centre of the flower at the top of the picture. At
about 9 am the stigma should be sticky, and the
pollen can be transferred onto it with a fine brush or
an ear bud.
• Cut a small marker from any thin but sturdy plastic in
a sharp triangle shape, about 2cm long and 6mm
wide. I use the Syntex labels.
• Mark the pollinated flower by pushing the marker
down into the flower right next to the stamen until
you feel some resistance, it needs to fit securely into
the cavity.
• Write down what cross you made, it takes a while for
the seed to ripen and you WILL forget what the cross
was, I write it with a permanent marker on the leaf of
the seed parent, the cross ALWAYS gets written with
the seed parent first and the pollen parent second.
• Wait for the seed to ripen, this can take 3 weeks to 18
months, so regular inspection of the crop is required.
• When the seed is ripe you will usually see the
change, in the case of any of the Bromelioideae
group (Aechmea, Billbergia, Neoregelia,
Orthophytum, etc..) you can pull on the ‘fruit’ gently
and if it’s ripe it will come away easily, the fruit will
sometimes have a different colour now too. In the
case of the Tillandsioideae family, the hard brown
capsules will start to split on the end (Vriesea,
Tillandsia, Lutheria, Goudaea, Catopsis, etc.) and
the same with the Pitcairnioideae group (Dyckia,
Puya, Pitcairnea, etc.)
• In the case of the Bromelioideae Group the seed
can be squeezed out of the berry fruit and onto a
clean piece of parchment, let it dry to make sowing
easier. The other two groups have dry seed, so the
capsules can be broken open and the seed
extracted and sown directly, (if the capsules
haven’t fully opened already).
• Bromeliad seeds need light to germinate, so they
should not be covered to exclude light. I use flat
seedling trays, with composted bark, but really any
flat container and any well draining mixture with no
fertilizer or chemicals added will do.
• A brace is needed so the cover doesn’t lie on the
seed. I cut strips from 2L coke bottles, but wire works
Label the plant with
the details.
About 3 months later and ready for the first
cull if the goal was to get variegated
plants. You can see some varigation in the
close up photo.
S e e d l i n g s
transplanted into
128 division trays.
Removing the pollen. Allow the pollen to dry. Storing pollen.
Squeeze the seed
Transferring the pollen. Making markers. Marking the flower.
Wait for seed to ripen. Extracting the ‘fruit’.
Germinating the seeds in flat trays covered
with a ziplock bag.
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East London Bromeliad Society South Africa October 2017 Page 3
just as well when bent in
an arch shape. Cover with
a zip-lock bag and leave
the trays in a well lit
location.
• About 3 months later the
seedlings are ready for the
first cull if the goal was to
get variegated plants.
They should show signs of
variegation already and
the plain green ones can
be removed with tweezers.
Photo on the right shows
the variegation up close.
• The chosen seedlings can
now be planted into 128
division trays, with a good and well draining
potting medium (substrate), fertilizer can be
added at this stage to make them grow a
bit faster, but I don’t use any.
• They grow fast! About two months later
they are double the size.
• After about six months they should be
ready to be transplanted into larger 24
division trays, time to cull all the unwanted
seedlings again.
• About a year later they can be re-potted
into 12cm pots, again… culling the
undesirable seedlings.
• One to five years later the potential
should be clearly visible and the
unwanted plants can once again be
culled … keep only the best of the best, if
any.
• The photo above right shows in my
opinion, good hybrid siblings.
• The photo far right shows unstable
variegation, (only on one side) these will
be culled….
• Right, twelve Vriesea made it to the final
selection out of about 2000 seedlings.
More will be culled… yes… the green
ones.
• Far right, a perfect plant, in my opinion, in
flower and ready to be registered. (I did
register this one as Neoregelia ‘Kyleigh
Kriek’, named for my sister’s daughter.
• Right: To register your plant: Go
onto the BSI website, click on
‘New Registration’. Fill out the
form, and press “submit”, another
page will then open where you
can submit photos of your plant:
one photo from above, one from
the side, and a close up of the
flower (if it is interesting enough to
be noted). You are now done!
And it only took 1 to 12 years !!! Photos and article - Christo van Wijk
In my opinion these are good hybrid siblings.
Unstable variegation,
these will be culled.
A perfect plant in my opinion, which
I have registered. as Neoregelia
‘Kyleigh Kriek’, named for my niece.
Twelve Vriesea hybrids made it out of
out of about 200 seedlings.
1 - 5 years later the
potential is becoming
visible.
They grow fast!
Variegations can be
seen in some. Time
to cull again.
After 6 months they are
ready to be re-potted
again.
A year later re-potting
into 12cm pots and
culling again.
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Library - Brenda Wegner There are some interesting topics worth reading appearing in Volume 66(2): 65 - 128 of
the Journal of the Bromeliad Society April – June 2016
• CONFERENCE CORNER – The planning of the 2018 World Bromeliad Conference to
be held in San Diego is well under way. The venue is the fantastic bayside resort
Paradise Point.
• GENERAL – BSI66 Fund update by Rick Ryals and Lyn Wegner.
• SCIENCE – A new species of Cipuropsis, and some remarks about this recently
resurrected genus.
• IN THE WILD – In Honour of Franz Georg Gruber (Part 1): In search of a very special
bromeliad: Goudaea ospinae var. gruberi Luther written by Peter Tristram. It is all
about Peter’s amazing adventures in Colombia exploring to find two Goudaea
ospinae varieties in habitat.
• IN GENERAL – The BSI 2016 Financial Report.
• The search for Irish Bromeliads by Jay Thurrott.
Member News • Our very sincere condolences to Tracy and Robert Moss on the death of Tracy’s mom, on the 9th October.
Many of you will remember her well from being on the till at Pioneer Nursery for many, many years. We are
thinking of the family and Christopher, Tracy’s brother, as he deals with his own health issues too at this sad
time.
We have three members opening their gardens for the Pam Golding Gardens of
East London Garden Show this year to be
held on the weekend of the 11/12th
November, Larraine Parathyras, Dudley
Reynolds and Elna Smit, who are busy
preparing their special gardens right now in
readiness for this annual event. I am sure
the bromeliads and tillandsia in these
gardens will blow visitors away! Another
wonderful opportunity to promote bromeliads in our community! There
will be 25 gardens in total that you can go and visit. All you have to do is
buy a ticket for R50 and support your favourite charity to enable you to
see them all!
Thanks • Dr Boots and Alison Horsfall for hosting a really super meeting.
• Michael and Zena McClaren and Larraine Parathyras for eats for tea
time.
• Pete Pfister, Eddie and Barbara Black for Lucky Draw plants.
Congratulations to the September Raffle
Winners • Miriam Kennard chose an unnamed Neoregelia.
• Glen Reynolds chose Aechmea blanchetiana variegated
• Val Nel chose Neoregelia ‘Margaret’ for her daughter Caryn Dunlop's
winning ticket.
• Eddie Black chose Billbergia ‘Hallelujah’.
• Christo van Wijk from Pretoria won 2 plants, he chose Billbergia 'Esther'
and Tillandsia streptophylla
• Adele and Beurich from Cape Town chose Neoregelia 'Brown
Recluse'
• Richard King from Darling chose Neoregelia 'Running Red River'
From the Committee • At the meetings members appreciate Lucky Draw and give-
away bromeliads which we rely on members to supply. So if
Some of our raffle winners for September,
Miriam Kennard, Val Nel and Eddie Black.
Neoregelia ‘Running Red
River ‘ Neoregel ia 'Brown
Recluse'
Great to welcome visitors to the meeting, Left
and right, keen bromeliad enthusiast Tony
Manthe and Karin, centre Gavin and Sandy.
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East London Bromeliad Society South Africa October 2017 Page 5
you have any to spare, do bring them along to the meetings.
• Members are welcome to sell plants or other items after the meeting but
PLEASE ensure that you put your name clearly on your ‘box’ so shoppers
know who to pay. Collecting payment etc is your own responsibility.
• Breath of Life Garden: ELBS has donated 10 stepping stones towards one
of the new bromeliad gardens at Breath of Life. Just a reminder, they are
at 2 Dawson Road in Selborne and are open for tea every Wednesday
from 10 until 2. There is no charge but a small donation is appreciated.
They will gladly accept any bromeliad donations. This will be one of the
25 Pam Golding Open Gardens.
• The committee have realised that the society needs to invest in a
projector and screen to further enable our presenters at meetings to use
digital resources to illustrate their talks, it’s called keeping up with the
digital age! The proceeds from this year’s auction will be put towards the
purchase of a projector and screen. It’s not too early to start preparing and saving for your auction
donations and bids at the November end of year function!!
Upcoming Society Events 29th October: Val Nel and Caryn Dunlop at 2.00pm at 4 Fuschia Street in Vincent Heights.
Topic: Blooming Broms! Members are all invited to contribute to the meeting by bringing any blooming
bromeliads you have in your garden. Let’s make it a bumper blooming afternoon!
Please remember to bring your chair if you want a seat.
26th November: Brenda and Bryan Wegner in Nahoon Valley. End of year Christmas Auction, BBB Surprise and
Bring and Braai Function.
January 2018: Elna Smit in Gonubie
February: Esther Botha, Elna’s twin sister who lives on a farm, Adelsicht Farm 1337 Schafli road Chintsa.
March: Elna Smit’s farm garden, Kransig Farm Upper Kwelega.
BSI Matters - Lyn Wegner The BSI Officers, Directors and the Standing Committees are expected to submit annual reports of
their activities. It is very interesting to know what these people are doing and wonderful that they
make time in their busy lives to voluntarily do so much for bromeliad enthusiasts all over the world.
I have permission from Geoff Lawn, the BSI Cultivar Registrar, who is kept very busy adding all the
new hybrids and updating names as they change on the BSI Cultivar Registry to share his Report with you.
You might like to go into bsi.org and have a look at the BCR (Bromeliad Cultivar Register) if you are not
already familiar with it.
These are some of the comments from Geoff’s Director Report which I found interesting and I’m sure you will
too. For interest sake I will e-mail the full report to you separately.
1E: Registrations were received mostly from Australia (especially Queensland and New South Wales), New
Zealand, Hawaii, Costa Rica, Germany, Thailand, South Africa. As before, the areas proportionately with
the highest number of growers/ breeders and BSI affiliates - Florida, Texas and California, percentage-
wise register the least.
1F: Most populated genera of registered new cultivars and new accumulated totals: Neoregelia (6796),
Vriesea (1610 - predominantly in the Glyph Group), Billbergia (1992) and Tillandsia (1119).
Upcoming International Conferences 2018: World Bromeliad Conference to be held in San Diego, California from 29 May to 3 June 2018. Check out
the Conference Corner at bsi.org for more information. This will be the third WBC that will be held in San
Diego, California. Registration for the 2018 conference has already begun. If you are interested in going,
contact Lyn Wegner for more information.
2019: ‘Golden Broms’ 17-20 October 2019 Hosted by the Gold Coast Succulent and Bromeliad Society Inc.
at the Sea World Resort on the Gold Coast. This will be the 20th Australasian Bromeliad Conference. For
contact information go to the conference website at www.goldenbroms.com
2021: The New Zealand Bromeliad Society has recently confirmed that they will be hosting the bi-annual
Australasian Bromeliad Conference again in 2021.
Right: One of the newly established
bromeliad gardens at Breath of Life.
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East London Bromeliad Society South Africa October 2017 Page 6
From the Editor Many thanks to Christo van Wijk and Willie du Plessis for their visit last month
and Christo’s down to earth and illuminating talk and slide show on
Hybridising, Culling and Registering of Bromeliads at the September
meeting. It went a long way to enhance my understanding of this topic.
Your wonderful enthusiasm and love of rare plants is contagious, much
appreciated Christo!
After some decent rain we have had so far this Spring, everything has
started greening up after a very loooooong and dry period, Aechmea and
Vriesea are sending out spikes and even some of my Cryptanthus are
putting out their delicate little flowers. Neoregelia are colouring nicely,
maturing and putting out their beautiful little gem like flowers in their centres
and so much more to love. We truly are all besotted with a wonderful genus
of plants. So much variety and beauty to choose from to bring pleasure to
our lives, plus a fair amount of scratches and bleeding too from the spiky
monsters! I have a Vriesea hieroglyphica sending out a flower spike right
now, a first for us and so exciting! Every bromeliad garden needs one! The
topic of the next meeting is Blooming Broms! So do bring one of your
current beauties along to the meeting on Sunday, or, if it is too big to bring
along, send me a photo via Whatsapp or e-mail and I will include in the
next newsletter. This is not excluding country members, please send yours
too!!!!!!
The Pam Golding Gardens of East London Show is coming up in two weeks, I
know that many of our members participate in visiting as many gardens as
they possibly can over the weekend it is on, (yes we are crazy! Lol!), I
certainly do on the Saturday and then take Eddie to the best on the
Sunday, and all in aid of charity. We must be very proud of our members,
Larraine Parathyras and Dudley Reynolds and Elna Smit who are busy
prepping their gardens for show. What a wonderful opportunity to
showcase bromeliads to the East London community of garden lovers!
Please support our members, worthy charities and this ‘feast for the eyes’
annual event!
Apologies for the newsletter being hugely delayed this month due to me
having too much of a good time since before the last meeting! I have been
away twice, we had visitors and we also had our eldest granddaughter to
stay for a week on her first solo holiday away from her family. Loads of fun
was had, plus she was happy to potter in the garden a bit in the afternoons,
cutting dead stuff and pottering and drawing graffiti with big chalks
everywhere outdoors. We had so much fun but there came a time after over a month of minimal time spent
in our garden, when I started feeling as if I was getting ‘garden withdrawal symptoms’, I needed to get out
there, get dirty and look after and enjoy my bromeliads! So after much here, there and back again we are
home and getting back to normal, see you at the meeting on Sunday, don’t forget to bring a blooming
brom! Happy bromming!!!
[email protected] 072 1787 421
This is a publication for the East London Bromeliad Society, South Africa for the interest of its members.
Articles may be used by non profit societies with acknowledgement to the author where applicable and East
London Bromeliad Society South Africa. Please use the photos that accompany the article used. If you
require higher resolution photos please request them from the Editor.
Any opinions expressed in articles are not necessarily those of the Society.
When submitting items for inclusion in this newsletter, please ensure that all information, including spelling is
checked and accurate.
Dr Pete Pfister, far right, hosted Willie and
Christo during their whirlwind stay in East
London last month. He also took them to
see a few members gardens. It was
great to welcome them to our garden
too!
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East London Bromeliad Society South Africa October 2017 Page 7
ELBS is an affiliate of the Bromeliad Society International.
ELBS Address: c/o 18 Wentworth Road, Sunnyridge, East London 5201 South Africa,
We meet on the last Sunday of every month, January to November, at various venues around East London.
We have a topic for each meeting and Show and Tell where members are encouraged to bring along their
brag or problem plants. There are member raffles, lucky draws for those present, tea time, library and
member plant sales, plus a monthly newsletter sent out via e-mail only. Visitors are always welcome and can
attend three meetings before they will need to join the society in order to continue attending. Annual subs
are R120.00 for individuals/families and R60 for students.
Peter Cook from Sunnybroms (Australia) has very kindly created a link to ELBS newsletters on their web page.
https://bromeliadnewsletters.wordpress.com/east-london-south-africa/
You can access:
• All the back copies of the 2016 and 2017 ELBS Newsletters
• The first of the BSI BCR genus changes and cultivar changes generated via DNA studies complied by Derek
Butcher the BSI Cultivar Registrar.
You will find ELBS on Facebook: [email protected] or type ‘East London Bromeliad
Society’ into the fb search bar. You can request to join the group and will then be able to upload your photos
and comments on the wall. The ELBS SA page and other bromeliad related sites are becoming a useful and
informative forum to share and ‘meet up’ with other like-minded bromeliad folks. There are also many other
bromeliad related sites that you can join and become part of a world wide online sharing environment.
You can view most of all the bromeliads mentioned in meetings or in the newsletter at the following websites:
The BSI’s official Bromeliad Cultivar Registry www.registry.bsi.org which is maintained by Geoff Lawn, the BSI
Cultivar Registrar. Plus other information regarding the Bromeliad Society International is found at bsi.org
Florida Council of Bromeliad Societies: fcbs.org This is a very useful site to reference many bromeliads where
you can clarify identification or just trawl through the site and add to your wish list!
Encyclopedia of Bromeliads - http://bromelia.club (Bromeliad Taxonomists and Growers Society) has
photographs. It also now has keys for the genera and sub-genera. If you like to be informed what is
happening, just follow on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bromeliadsencyclopedia Just type in
‘Encyclopeadia of Bromeliads’ into the Facebook search bar.
For internet resources you can also go to TAXON (The New Bromeliad List) for the most authoritative and right
up to date list of genera and species, accepted and new names and taxonomic keys - http://
botu07.bio.uu.nl/bcg/taxonList.php or just type in ‘New Bromeliad Taxon List’, it's much easier!
Committee Members
Chairman: Dudley Reynolds 079 488 2360 [email protected]
Vice- Chairman: Dr Peter Pfister 082 625 5533 [email protected]
PRO & Secretary: Lyn Wegner 043 736 1737 082 970 2293 [email protected]
Treasurer: Lynn Friend 043 748 2271 083 318 1179 [email protected]
Editor & Publisher: Barbara Black 043 7212775 O72 1787 421 [email protected]
Proof Reader: Lyn Wegner 043 736 1737 082 970 2293 [email protected]
Raffles: Lyn Odendaal 043 726 1075 083 441 6813 [email protected]
Librarian: Brenda Wegner 082 743 2141 [email protected]
Catering Co-ordinators: Eddie Black and
Larraine Parathyras
043 7212775
043 726 3167
082 5505 347
082 594 4559
Events Co-ordinator: Brenda Wegner 082 743 2141 [email protected]
Additional member: Betty Heunis 073 226 1610 [email protected]
Photo Credits: Christo van Wijk, Barbara Black, Lyn Wegner.