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BROMELI ANA PUBLISHED BY THE NEW YORK BROMELIAD SOCIETY1 (visit our website www.nybromeliadsociety.org) October, 2015 Vol. 52, No. 7 MANAGING AND MAINTAINING MY PLANT COLLECTION by Cynthia Percarpio I love plants - particularly bromeliads. The dried out or died due to the lack of a simple watering challenge is that my time is very limited; I have two schedule. So I came up with a working system which little kids, some pets and a full-time job. Balancing helps keep my plants alive during the cooler months. everything in life can be tricky. I find, as I assume The plants in my garden window are on many of you share, that plants are a humidity trays which help alleviate wonderful escape - watching these the dryness. Most importantly, I specimens grow and thrive brings keep a colorful post-it note on the amazement and joy as well as a trim of the window indicating the sense of satisfaction. date that the plants were last There are a few tricks that I watered. I use the same post-it to have utilized most recently in order write on for many weeks. to improve the success rate and Surprisingly (or not) I’ve realized increase the overall vibrancy of my that I have no clue as to when I last bromeliads. Included in this article watered the plants unless I write it are maintaining a watering schedule, down! So, this list is essential. water quality, fertilization, potting, I also write down what part winter storage and record keeping. of the collection has been watered. All of these techniques help me take For instance, I keep a few tougher care of the plants better, feel more varieties in my chilly basement near organized and improve my overall Neoregelia ‘Aurora’, N. smithii and a sunny window. Specific notes are enjoyment of the collection. I will Passiflora anastasia in vintage McCoy pot very helpful. Since the basement is go into greater detail how I manage much cooler, the plants are watered to do this in this article. less frequently, or not at all if it gets in the 30’s. This year it was so cold in the basement that I had to move Watering Schedule them closer to the furnace and utilize artificial Especially during our frosty winter months in lighting. The only place that I failed to keep this the New York area, I often find it difficult to watering schedule was my workplace- and the results remember when the plants were last watered. The were not good. house becomes very dry from churning up the heat in Water Quality and Fertilizer the house. It is disheartening to find that a plant has We have very hard chlorinated water in my NEXT MEETING - Tuesday, October 6th , 2015 at 7:00 P.M. sharp at the Ripley-Grier Studios 520 8th Ave. (between 36th & 37th St) Room 16M CRYPTANTHUS - A video of Cypts in habitat, many species and cultivars and a discussion on potting, water, light, fertilizer - plus a demonstration of how to remove and pot up an offset. Please bring in plants for sale and for Show and Tell. Bromeliana -2- October, 2015 town, not the best for bromeliads. I bottle some of the This brings me great joy. I have a collection of water and leave it in the basement for a minimum of unique plants and equally decorative pots and finding 24 hours in order to eliminate the chlorine issue. This the perfect arrangement is so much fun. Using my year I watered most of the plants with used water own plants is also economical since I do not need to from my aquatic newts. Newts are amphibians that purchase many annuals to fill the pots. look like small colorful lizards. I change 20% of their water from a 20 gallon tank every week. The newts Record Keeping are very easy to care for, lovely to look at (for me at Having the names and dates on each cultivar least) and are fun to watch. The plants really thrived is important in order to develop an understanding of on this naturally fertilized water and many of the which plants are the best for my growing conditions. bromeliads, passionflowers and succulents in my Luckily I kept all the old plant order forms so it was collection bloomed. I highly recommend this regimen. easier to replace the tags that had gotten lost by More info on newts can be found on caudata.org comparing pictures for species that I found on the Florida Bromeliad Society data base with the plants Containers that I had purchased - for cultivars I use the During the winter months, small narrow Bromeliad Cultivar Register (BCR). I ask Herb Plever containers work best for windowsills. I noticed that for any help identifying other mystery bromeliads. this is how Herb Plever maintains much of his You need to use a pencil on a sturdy plastic collection. I often place several varieties in a tag along with the date of purchase. I got this trick of decorative pot along with a passionflower vine in writing the dates from my friend Betsy who has order to save precious space. I manage to fit most of maintained a very large plant collection for many the plants in my large garden window which protects years. An additional technique is to write down the them from my kids and the cat! Tougher plants go in names, date of acquisition, place of purchase, and the the sunny basement such as larger aechmeas and a fate of the plant in the back of a book or notebook. I few go to my workplace. use this technique for my passifloras because they are During the summer the plants are put outside trickier to replace. into decorative containers. The plants are put under So, if you are busy and forgetful like me, you my deck for a week prior to being repotted so that need the correct regimen to maintain and appreciate they do not get a sunburn. I make beautiful your collection. You will obtain greater enjoyment, arrangements each year and it is fun to see the broms better success, and a lower stress level due to better color up to their full glory. I mix my bromeliads, with record keeping and organization. Your plants will be annuals and passion flowers and other houseplants. happier and so will you! Post-it Notes T. cyanea, A. ‘Primera’ and succulents Ques. ‘Tim Plowman’ and succulents Bromeliana -3- Ocotber, 2015 TV COMPLEX by Herb Plever No, this article is not about a sub-genus Pseudocatopsis, as a division of psychological problem arising from Tillandsia, but it was subsequently given watching television, nor does it deal with separate genus status because its species a concentration of TV stations. It concerns all had strongly asymetric flower sepals in problems with identification in Tillandsia contrast to the other species in the genus. and Vriesea, and the relationship between In August, 1993 Jason R. Grant them. I suppose I should write the name wrote a critical article in Phytologia, in with a dash mark in-between, as T-V which he proposed moving 26 Vriesea Complex.. species to Tillandsia. For many years we were confused This proposal has been widely about the large number of Tillandsia look- accepted by the scientific community, alikes that were classified as Vrieseas. We including the New Bromeliad Taxon List always felt that there was something (http://botu07.bio.uu.nl/bcg/taxonList.php) wrong, because the taxonomy was published on line and maintained up-to- contradicted by the morphology or date almost daily by Derek Butcher and physical character of the plants. Eric Gouda. This is an important binomial Heretofore the character used to resource. Yet, 20 years later, the bi-annual distinguish Tillandsias and Vrieseas has Vriesea petal appendages Alphabetical List of Bromeliad been the presence (in Vriesea) or absence Binomials published by Selby Gardens (in Tillandsia) of petal appendages we call nectar has still continued as of the 2014 List to treat those scales that may be found attached to the inside base of Tillandsia look-alikes as Vrieseas. fcbs.org, a site the petals. But in 1989 Dr. Sue Gardner, and in 1992 often visited by growers to look at species photos, Brown and Terry, showed that making identifications also continues to list these plants as Vrieseas. (Sadly, primarily by using this character is flawed. this site is several years out of date.) Before tackling the T-V problem, it may help I have written several times before in the reader if I define where these genera sit in the Bromeliana about this situation and I return to the scheme of the latest taxonomy for the family issue, because it has created confusion among Bromeliaceae (Bromel-ee-ay-see-ee). There are now growers who want to have their plants properly eight recognized sub-families: Brochinioideae, labeled. I believe it is worth excerpting here some of Bromelioideae, Hechtioideae, Lindmanioideae, Dr. Grant’s proposal: Navioideae, Pictcairnioideae, Puyoideae and “The presence or Tillandsioideae. There are absence of petal 8 genera in sub-family appendages has historically Tillandsioideae: weighted heavily in Alcantarea, Catopsis, delineating generic limits in Glomeropitcairnia, the Bromeliaceae. Several Guzmania, Mezobromelia, genera are circumscribed Racinaea, Tillandsia and and distinguished from Vriesea. another on this basis alone. Most of the flower It is in fact the primary petals of the last three character used to named genera are more or distinguish Vriesea from less free and unattached Tillandsia in Smith & (except at their bases). Downs (1977)... Racinaea was once called “It has been recog- Tillandsia espinosae Tillandsia barclayana Bromeliana -4- October, 2015 Tillandsia cathcartii, ph.