Sunday, February 3, 2008

Unfinished business re: Chlorophytum x 'Fire Flash'

Just updating the record to include pictures of the flower:


and the seed pods:


of Chlorophytum x 'Fire Flash.' Many of you will have seen these in person before, and will think me kind of lame for making a whole post out of these, but so it goes.

This particular flower stalk isn't the most impressive I've ever seen. I mean, it should be adequate as far as getting me all the seeds I could want and then some, but they do get a lot bigger than this.


7 comments:

Andrew said...

Quick question: is this a ripe seedpod ready to be harvested or how should they look when they're ready to go?

mr_subjunctive said...

Usually, I think I've waited until at least some of the seedpods on the stalk have turned black/brown before considering the stalk "done" enough to cut off. I don't plant the seeds until the pod has gone completely black/brown.

Anonymous said...

Alright, thanks. I may be rushing things a bit. Even though the pods I have are at least a few months old, many are still green. One has split on its own. Hopefully I'll get a few that grow, even if only from that one pod.

Anonymous said...

I've had mine for 5 years and mine has never flowered. I do however live in Alaska so maybe the all day sun and then no sun is hard on it. I water it regularly and have in lower to modderate light. And suggestions?? It hasn't hardly grown in the time I've had it eirther. I saved it from Lowe's and almost all the leaves were damaged. So any suggestions are much appreciated.

mr_subjunctive said...

Anonymous:

My original plant hasn't flowered in about as long; it's in a spot where it gets some artificial light, though, so I had been assuming that that was the problem. You could try artificial lights on a timer this winter and see if that works; mine bloom when the nights are about 13 hours long.

It's also possible that the bloom time is coincidental in my case, and they're not actually sensitive to day length at all, in which case I couldn't guess what the problem is. I just repotted some that I've had in the same pots for a long time, so if pot size is a trigger, I should know soonish. If it's not day length or repotting, then maybe they're just really sporadic bloomers.

As far as the hardly-grown part goes, they're pretty slow growers. The seeds I started were I think about two years old before I could even think about selling them, and it's taken about six years to get them to the size of the original plant.

Damaged leaves you pretty much just have to wait until the plant grows new ones to replace the damaged ones. Direct sun, mechanical damage, and cold will all cause spots on new leaves.

Anonymous said...

I received my fire flash in the mail today he was hot and has bent broken leaves. How do I care for him as far as the leaves being damaged n browed bent..

mr_subjunctive said...

Unknown: you'll have to wait until the plant grows new leaves to replace the damaged ones.