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Posted

I guess these have a new family name? Dracaena!

I've got 4 simultaneously in flower... a Bella Mutomo, a Francisii,  a Cylindrica and also a Ballyi which is a little behind. I brought them in for winter and they coordinated finally!

If you have experience pollinating please share. I found one video - it looks easy... but any information to help would be appreciated.

Posted
7 hours ago, DallasPalms said:

I guess these have a new family name? Dracaena!

I've got 4 simultaneously in flower... a Bella Mutomo, a Francisii,  a Cylindrica and also a Ballyi which is a little behind. I brought them in for winter and they coordinated finally!

If you have experience pollinating please share. I found one video - it looks easy... but any information to help would be appreciated.

Like most Lily- type flowers, pollinating/ crossing these should be pretty straight forward.. Use a fine tip artist's paintbrush to transfer pollen from the donor to the Stigma of the chosen " mother " plant after removing the filaments on it so it can't try to self- pollinate, then monitor to see if the Ovary starts to swell. Can select a certain # of flowers to work with on each stalk rather than trying to cross every single flower as well. 

..And do post any progress pics. 

Posted

Thanks it looks easy enough. I prefer to pluck anthers and use them as a brush there are lots of flowers opening any day now... i saw a guy on youtube waving one plant over the other. Looks easy!

With succulents there seems to be a prime time I know some cacti open at night and rely on moths or bats... I guess with these i can pollinate throughout the day and see

Posted
37 minutes ago, DallasPalms said:

Thanks it looks easy enough. I prefer to pluck anthers and use them as a brush there are lots of flowers opening any day now... i saw a guy on youtube waving one plant over the other. Looks easy!

With succulents there seems to be a prime time I know some cacti open at night and rely on moths or bats... I guess with these i can pollinate throughout the day and see

I guess you could just wave one stalk over another but you risk self pollinating in doing that.  Someone who is serious about making crosses pursues a  more disciplined technique. I myself would reduce many flowers down to just a handful and work w/ those.

Cacti, even night flowering types are pretty easy ( have a lot, which i cross, -to some degree at least-, each year ) but require the same discipline ( though i rarely strip off anthers, most are too small/difficult to get to w/out damaging other parts ). I'll closely monitor any that are close to opening so i can pollinate the instant they are open, but just before they start shedding pollen. Have a few that are strictly functionally male or female which makes things a bit easier, except when plants that say will produce viable pollen, but are otherwise infertile present the better flowers..   Even when you have done things correctly, some just don't take, or, you end up with a few seeds to work with..  Still fun to do, esp. when you get new plants that may be crossed to work with from your efforts.

  • Upvote 1
  • 2 weeks later...
Posted

Cuticle scissors work to remove anthers they stick long enough to brush... I just used tweezers and carefully bend and twist... I didnt realize they self pollinate! 

I had my names wrong it was Koko who opened first and then bella mutomo a few days after... then cylindrica... still waiting for ballyi.

I think I have fruit development on Koko!

Exciting :)

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  • Like 1
Posted

Fruit swelling on Bella Mutomo I think

 

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  • 2 weeks later...
Posted (edited)

I ended up with 6 fruits on Koko and 2 on Bella Mutomo. Then three weeks later two more started forming on koko but I screwed up with Bella. I poured the tiniest amount of water onto the roots of an offset just because it was in my hand and the two fruits on the adjoining mother plant were aborted over a few days...  I poured a little on looks offsets too and nothing changed except more fruits... it could have been other reasons maybe low winter window light but I strongly suspect the water even with gritty mix it's probably to much. 

8 from Koko is really nice. They are mostly double fruits and one single seems to be maturing early...  it is orange already and not even a month has passed.! Someone mention somewhere that their fruits took 3 months? If anyone knows please chime in.

Also on the last two fruits they started off as doubles whereas most of the others started as one, expanded, and then started forming the other... I wonder if this effect can come from having a different pollinator? Cylindrica had flowers open last and I couldn't get any to take but it's possible that the last two Koko fruits were pollinated by Cylindrica.

If anyone has any experience please chime in even if it's 5 or 10 years from now when you come across this post!

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Edited by DallasPalms
  • 3 years later...
Posted

Hi everyone Long time!

I stopped in to update about progress with seedlings. It's been ablut two years and my first batch are three offspring of KoKos Crater finally getting to size where I'll need to separate and pot them up.

Inwas also able to germinate more from the same Mother plant earlier this year. At least one I believe is crossed with a variety called Valentina but not sure.

I had six seeds from Valentina too and three sprouted but they all rotted.. I did learn a better pollination method however and I'm sharing it for whoever wants to breed these in areas where insects don't so the trick (especially since they flower in around December or Janiary when most places are wintery)

Take the flowers that have matured and up to several days from that point wven if they are dried but not exposed to extremes. It's not easy to line up flowering times they all seem to vary alot.. but take about two or three and put them together with the anthers postioned .. roll the two or three between your index fingers until they spin.. do it very closely to the pistil on a plant that is in bloom and on the day that they open.. do not touch it that seems to not work.. but if you spin it and to where your fingers move up as you are spinning them you can see a poof of pollen fly out and if you have strad hands you can make it fall over the pistil.. I think that's what it's called.  I was much more successful this year than last year and Valentina was the one where I tried it most..  unfortunatley those ones didn't handle humidity well at all 

But anyhow I hope others wwill grow and collect these... and there are newer fancy ones. Look them up on Pinterest there are some amazing crosses out there and they are nice to have despite having to bring them indoors every winter where they help detoxify the air 😎 if you manage to find the fancy one from over seas and have extras to swap pls let me know if have a nice sized collection 

Here are the seedlings. The largest obviously around two years. The smaller just a few months 

 

 

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  • Upvote 1
Posted

Another photo showing form of the young seedlings more accurately. I took from the other side. The third obviously a dwarf. 

Koko is an odd ball growing two forms and so I wonder how these will change but I can definitely see some of the traits especially the dark green color and red edges 

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