Friday, April 24, 2015

Pretty picture: Psychopsis Kalihi

I've only written about one previous Psychopsis, a very different-looking one (here), which was from the 2011 show. When I did, a couple people said in the comments that they really loved the genus, which surprised me.


Not that there's anything especially wrong with the genus; I appreciate that they're at least weird, and sometimes they're colorful (the previously-posted one is, anyway; I'm not so much into this brown-and-yellow thing). It had just never occurred to me that they might be beloved, you know? Not sure I get it even still, and I can't say I aspire to grow one someday, but it at least got me to take another look at a genus I'd dismissed as being pointlessly weird.

Wikipedia says that the flowers look like "large butterflies with brightly colored bodies . . . , very long antennae-like petals, and outspread wing-like dappled yellow and brown sepals." Not sure I see that in this particular case, but I definitely see it in the photo of P. papilio they used for the article, and the photo of P. krameriana at Wikimedia Commons. Though it's odd that Kalihi isn't shaped like either of those species, since it's their hybrid.

Psychopsis Kalihi = Psychopsis krameriana x Psychopsis papilio (Ref.)

If anyone missed the previous post, I'm ever-so-slowly gearing up to sell some cuttings from the Schlumbergera seedlings. If you have any interest in this, check that post out. Demand has been a lot lower than I was expecting, but even so, people have called dibs on all the available cuttings of 023A "Stoked" and 088A "Cyborg Unicorn" already. So, if you found one of the seedlings interesting enough to want one yourself, you should speak up sooner rather than later.


2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I suspect you are not seeing more interest in the Schlum cuttings not because of anything against your plants but probably because the majority of serious houseplant enthusiasts who would be reading your blog probably already have a Schlum since they are fairly common plants.
If (like most of us who really love plants) you are short on space for plants, I think it is harder to justify owning multiple different Schlums than it is to justify owning multiple variations of Dracaena for example since the Schlums only really look different when they are bloom.

I am thinking I might want to purchase some of them for gifts to ship to friends who are newer to the plant world if you are going to allow for multiple plant orders.

mr_subjunctive said...

Anonymous:

I didn't mean to imply that I was taking it personally or anything. I'd just kind of over-prepared. And no doubt you're right about them all looking pretty much the same for most of the year.

Haven't changed the original post yet, but yes, I'm lifting the two-plant-per-customer limit, as of today.