Baja,
I was looking through my seed collection this morning. In it I found a packet of seed labeled Aloe, no idea which of the few Aloes I have it came from.

Dated 2014 so I assume it should sill be viable.

Any recommendations on how to germinate it? Intend to try some in a Bottle Baggie but want to spread the risk of losing all seed.

Cheers

I use 10-15cm pots, wider than deep, with about 5-8cm depth of soil, and sow the seeds on top of (saturated) wet soil with a thin layer of fine pumice on top, and clear plastic wrap or a recycled piece of clear plastic for a lid. I also use a saucer to keep moisture from leaving the bottom. The plastic lid stays on until they are relatively independent (actual time depends on the size and species of the seed, sometimes on the seed leaf but sometimes after a couple of adult leaves have sprouted) and at that point I gradually wean them (with misting) to a regimen of watering twice a week.

Baja_Costero said:I use 10-15cm pots, wider than deep, with about 5-8cm depth of soil, and sow the seeds on top of (saturated) wet soil with a thin layer of fine pumice on top, and clear plastic wrap or a recycled piece of clear plastic for a lid. I also use a saucer to keep moisture from leaving the bottom. The plastic lid stays on until they are relatively independent (actual time depends on the size and species of the seed, sometimes on the seed leaf but sometimes after a couple of adult leaves have sprouted) and at that point I gradually wean them (with misting) to a regimen of watering twice a week.

Thanks Baja.

Hope this means I am going to see my Pereskiopsis flower soon.


Anyone know whether Pereskiopsis selfs?
Cheers

As predicted, it was a bit warm today.

See what happened to the C. edulis, it will recover I assume, it has in the past.

Cheers

Had an email from my neighbour this morning:
On 22/01/19 07:39, Tania Lewin wrote:
> Weather never gets it right 48 in the shade 45 inside

She took a couple of photos which I have permission to send extracts from.

Cheers

ausrpned said:This looks more than interesting, Hatiora gaertneri appears to have set a fruit.

Hopefully that is the case and any seed is viable.

Have only the one Hatiora gaertneri plant so unless the species is self fertile, it will take some time and luck, to determine the pollen parent.



Cheers

The capsule/fruit still looks the same, anyone seen what a mature capsule looks like or at what stage it can be harvested for seed?

Cheers

Have been trying to get some reasonable photos of the interaction between Honey Eaters, flowering Mistletoe and flowering A. americana.

Had some success today.

Noticed in a post recently A. americana being referred to as the Blue Agave. In the past had thought the term only applied to A. tequilana, one lives and hopefully learns.



Bees are also hoeing in but concentrating on collecting pollen by the look of it.

Cheers

Very nice pics!

There are so many blue agaves that I don't think the term is specific to any one. The term appears on tequila bottles as a kind of marketing, more than anything else. Perhaps to distinguish the product from lesser formulations derived in part from cane sugar. Anyway I'd use that term to describe the color of the plant, rather than as a common name.

Baja_Costero said:Very nice pics!
There are so many blue agaves that I don't think the term is specific to any one. The term appears on tequila bottles as a kind of marketing, more than anything else. Perhaps to distinguish the product from lesser formulations derived in part from cane sugar. Anyway I'd use that term to describe the color of the plant, rather than as a common name.

Recall the time when the South Africans were using A. americana to produce liquor, caused a bit of a stink from memory. From my recollection the fellow behind the enterprise was reputed to have committed suicide, often wondered given the name and the political situation around then.

Cheers

The South African experience with agave liquor, or agave spirits as they seem to call it, is interesting. Random info-bits on the subject here

http://www.ianchadwick.com/teq...

where the author refers to the plant as the "Mexican blue agave" (of which there are probably dozens in the most literal sense).

The agaves in this video do not look like tequilanas to me (that's the only species of agave referred to when they stamp "agave azul" on tequila bottles in Mexico):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

which is fine, but that would make the product a mezcal and not a tequila per se. Both of those terms are reserved for Mexican production anyway, so the SA version is called "agave spirit" instead.

Interesting little tangent here. Thanks for bringing it up!

Baja_Costero said:
Interesting little tangent here. Thanks for bringing it up!

It's been quite some time since I went to the site so did so just now. It has changed a bit but still very informative especially to a newbie.

Further to the South African usage of A. americana, it is reported to be used as a drought forage. Mid-last year I mentioned this to someone here and they were most surprised.

From personal experience I have tasted the "leaf" of both A. americana and cv marginata after using a microwave to cook it. For me the marginata was the sweetest.

Have also fed both the "leaves" and slices of the quiote after cooking them in water, to poultry, they enjoyed it leaving only the outer circle of the quiote slice, bit tough I think.

It's a problem at times thinking with the stomach .

Cheers

Puzzling over why there is such a low incidence of seed set for A. americana here.

Can only recall ever seeing one plant which had set seed, many, many years ago.

No lack of attention from Bees and Birds.

There was a small plant with a easily accessible inflorescence so decided to take a bit of a look.



Appears to be a perfect flower, stamens, pistil with I assume, a viable stigma.

Pulled down an older inflorescence to see what from ground level, appeared to have the style terminating well above the anthers.


Is it because the bees only concentrate on the anthers, the birds below on the nectaries, no pollen reaches the stigma?

Have placed a bag over the small inflorescence and will attempt to collect the pollen the bees collect, then do a hand pollination.

Be interesting to see what happens.

Cheers

I can't remember the details, and I confess I've never paid any attention to the actual plants, but I think at least some americanas may not set seed. A consequence of domestication, perhaps? (Like Aloe vera.)

On another site we just had the opposite discussion: finding what the poster thinks is americanas that instead of setting seed were producing mainly bulbils, which is apparently uncommon.

It could simply be due to the absence of the correct pollinator as many of the Agaves depend on specific moths, (humming) birds, or maybe even bats for pollination, not so much bees afaik.

Last night I checked the covered flowers again, no sign of any pollen. Thought what the heck will use some of my surplus Hylo pollen on the three flowers and see what happens.

This morning there was still no sign of any pollen on the covered flowers so the cover was replaced.

Bees were still working the removed umbel this morning. though I could not see what they were collecting but it still appeared it was the anthers they were interested in.


Then examined the removed flower but could not see any pollen on it's anthers.

When I looked at the photo I took, saw what looked suspiciously like pollen grains on the frame the the flower was resting.

Went back with a magnifying glass and saw there was a considerable amount of the suspected pollen grains under the removed umbel.

Will try to remove another umbel this evening and see if I can see pollen grains on the flowers.

One other observation is that the flowers offer nothing to attract either Birds nor Bees during the day until approx 5-6pm.


Cheers

Baja_Costero said:I can't remember the details, and I confess I've never paid any attention to the actual plants, but I think at least some americanas may not set seed. A consequence of domestication, perhaps? (Like Aloe vera.)

There is an interesting article on Research Gate

From: Seed production and gametophyte formation in Agave
tequilana and Agave Americana

https://www.researchgate.net/p...

Manual self-pollination
Anthers were removed from unopened floral buttons,
which were then covered with pollination bags (normally
used for maize) and allowed to develop until the stigmas
were receptive (moist stigmas). Anthers with mature pol-
len grains from around 10 flowers of the same plant were
collected immediately before pollination and, using a
paintbrush, pollen was transferred to the mature stigmas.
Pollinated flowers were again bagged and left to develop
fruit. These procedures were carried out for A. tequilana
plants At3, At4, and At5, and A. americana (Aa) plant.

Which makes a similar comment about both A. americana and A. tequilana.

Cheers

mcvansoest said:On another site we just had the opposite discussion: finding what the poster thinks is americanas that instead of setting seed were producing mainly bulbils, which is apparently uncommon.

That is what occurs here, is there a plant switch which comes into play if pollination is unsuccessful? The plant then produces bulbils instead.

Cheers

Not sure, many infertile Agaves tend to make bulbils - like Agave weberi - but then there are that do both, so if there is a specific switch/condition is unclear to me. Damage preventing successful flowering does appear to trigger bulbils in at least some Agaves.

From my experiences with flowering Agaves, I would say that the flowers you are looking at do not yet have fully matured anthers - ie. there is little to no pollen yet to be had/observed. . In the overview picture there are some anthers that look past - the curly bent ones - those may have some pollen left, but many might have dropped it.

My weberi never produced any pollen on the anthers, but a xylonacantha that flowered last year produced loads of pollen. interestingly the appearance of pollen appears to precede receptiveness of the stigma (observable when it produces nectar) by some time. I did notice that if I was not there right as the pollen became available the bees were very efficient in taking it. Very efficient!

The thing with americanas is that it is a very variable species that probably contains quite a few hybrid genetics, so some being sterile, some not, some producing bulbils, while others do not is probably not very surprising.

mcvansoest said:
From my experiences with flowering Agaves, I would say that the flowers you are looking at do not yet have fully matured anthers - ie. there is little to no pollen yet to be had/observed. . In the overview picture there are some anthers that look past - the curly bent ones - those may have some pollen left, but many might have dropped it.

I pulled down four umbels yesterday afternoon, could see no pollen and placed them in a bag.

Looking at them this morning there were a few Bees working but I could see none with pollen sacs.

If I get a chance this evening or tomorrow morning, will try to pull down another umbel while the Bees are working the flowers, if there is pollen available they should have sacs with at least a little pollen available.

Getting harder to pull down an umbel, my ladder was really too short when I collected yesterday, may have to try shooting a leader string up then pull up the main rope I have been using.

My weberi never produced any pollen on the anthers, but a xylonacantha that flowered last year produced loads of pollen. interestingly the appearance of pollen appears to precede receptiveness of the stigma (observable when it produces nectar) by some time. I did notice that if I was not there right as the pollen became available the bees were very efficient in taking it. Very efficient!

Have you any photo's of pollen on Agave or related, anthers or tasted the stigma exudate?

Cheers

Off topic @ausrpned , but have you ever touched a gympie-gympie plant?