Seedling Debaoensis

[Gallop]

Seedling Cycas debaoensis starting to push nice leaves. 

Edited September 10, 2023 by Gallop

[DippyD]

On 9/10/2023 at 8:16 AM, Gallop said:

Seedling Cycas debaoensis starting to push nice leaves. 

How much sun you giving these guys? I have a handful but man they are slow!

[Gallop]

5 hours ago, DippyD said:

How much sun you giving these guys? I have a handful but man they are slow!

Growing them under a shade cloth, filtered light.  Fast grower. They like high humidity and fertilizer. If your lucky enough to get a hold of one it’s definitely worth growing. I’ve been told only a handful of seed made it to the US. These get huge and apparently they trunk. Differant than what has been on the market as C debaoensis all these years. 

[Gallop]

To give you an idea what they’ll look like.

[Merlyn]

@DippyD I have a variety of Cycas in that "hybrid swarm" group.  The supposedly "pure" Debaoensis and Multipinnata (both tripinnate fronds) flush one giant 10-15' long frond at a time.  I have both of those in full shade to full sun here in the swamp of Florida.  They grow a lot faster in sun, but look better with some PM shade.  In sun they tend to be a weaker green, and can even bleach out if it happens to flush during a hot drought.  Micholitzii burn to a crisp in full sun here, and my one Bifida seems happy with canopy.  The hybrid swarm Multifrondis that looks like an intermediate of Micholitzii and Deb/Multi seems to be very sun tolerant too. 

I snapped up a bunch of 1-3" caudex seedlings over the past few years from various sources (PTers CBLisa, ChuckG, and local seller MB Palms, palmseeds.net when it existed).  It's taken several years to figure out which ones are which species.  They really need to get to 6' long fronds before they start showing the complete leaf character.  The reason this matters is that the Micholitzii-heavy hybrids might burn to a crisp in sun...but a Deb or Deb-heavy hybrid would probably do just fine.  If it's flushing 3 to 6 fronds at a time it's probably a hybrid.

As an FYI, everything within this species group is HIGHLY susceptible to scale.  I had an outbreak start here about a month ago.  I have ~50 Cycas in the ground and ~30 in pots, and 90% of the affected species are Mich/Bifida/Deb/Multipinnata/Multifrondis and Rev x Deb hybrids.  My Bifida had about 3 inches of the base of 1 frond with a light coating of scale, and within 1 week it had expanded over the entire 10' long frond. 

[DippyD]

1 hour ago, Gallop said:

To give you an idea what they’ll look like.

What an awesome looking Cycad! I have mine in shade, guess I’ll move them out to a little more sun exposure. Whatever they are… i know there’s a lot of confusion.

[DippyD]

26 minutes ago, Merlyn said:

@DippyD I have a variety of Cycas in that "hybrid swarm" group.  The supposedly "pure" Debaoensis and Multipinnata (both tripinnate fronds) flush one giant 10-15' long frond at a time.  I have both of those in full shade to full sun here in the swamp of Florida.  They grow a lot faster in sun, but look better with some PM shade.  In sun they tend to be a weaker green, and can even bleach out if it happens to flush during a hot drought.  Micholitzii burn to a crisp in full sun here, and my one Bifida seems happy with canopy.  The hybrid swarm Multifrondis that looks like an intermediate of Micholitzii and Deb/Multi seems to be very sun tolerant too. 

I snapped up a bunch of 1-3" caudex seedlings over the past few years from various sources (PTers CBLisa, ChuckG, and local seller MB Palms, palmseeds.net when it existed).  It's taken several years to figure out which ones are which species.  They really need to get to 6' long fronds before they start showing the complete leaf character.  The reason this matters is that the Micholitzii-heavy hybrids might burn to a crisp in sun...but a Deb or Deb-heavy hybrid would probably do just fine.  If it's flushing 3 to 6 fronds at a time it's probably a hybrid.

As an FYI, everything within this species group is HIGHLY susceptible to scale.  I had an outbreak start here about a month ago.  I have ~50 Cycas in the ground and ~30 in pots, and 90% of the affected species are Mich/Bifida/Deb/Multipinnata/Multifrondis and Rev x Deb hybrids.  My Bifida had about 3 inches of the base of 1 frond with a light coating of scale, and within 1 week it had expanded over the entire 10' long frond. 

Thanks for the info I’ll post some photos of what i have…

[DippyD]

Here are my stretched out cycas somethings…. 😂

[Gallop]

One of my seedlings pushing 3 leaves

[Gallop]

For comparison here is a hybrid swarm seedling I have. Growing side by side the hybrids stand out, some more than others. There are some nice hybrids out there. 

[Gallop]

8 minutes ago, DippyD said:

Here are my stretched out cycas somethings…. 😂

Good looking plants Brett. I suppose unless you know what locality the seed were originally collected it’s anyones guess what you might have. There is some information online but I believe true C debaoensis was only recently available and there are no known coning plants in the US that I’m aware of. 

[Merlyn]

@DippyD I'd think that yours is either Deb or Multifrondis hybrid swarm.  The bipinnate bottom stems on the latest frond rule out Micholitzii, but it may take a few years to get big enough to really know for sure.  As I understand it, the main difference from Debaoensis and Multipinnata are the plumosity of the frond.  Like the below picture of Sim Lav holding up a big Debao frond, it is very plumose and overall triangular in shape with tripinnately compound leaves.  Fronds may be up to 4' wide (or so) near the base.  Multipinnata is also tripinnately compound but a more exaggerated triangular shape and not plumose at all...or very very lightly plumose.  The fact that yours have leaves coming off in several different planes means it's extremely unlikely to be Multipinnata.  But it certainly could be a Debao, it'll just take a couple of more flushes to judge. 

I asked MB Palms about the "Debaoensis" seedlings he was selling at the Leu Gardens show.  I have a couple that I bought 3 or 4 years ago, and they are clearly Multifrondis unknown hybrids.  He said that the new ones he's selling are from a sexed pair at a friend's house and he's hand pollinating them.  Here's an example of a Multifrondis hybrid, with bipinnately compound leaves.  This frond (covered in scale) was about 8 feet long.  If it's gotten that big and isn't tripinnately compound, it's probably not going to turn into one. This was an MB Palms plant from 2022, so it may be that his are all Multifrondis too.

 

[DippyD]

3 minutes ago, Merlyn said:

@DippyD I'd think that yours is either Deb or Multifrondis hybrid swarm.  The bipinnate bottom stems on the latest frond rule out Micholitzii, but it may take a few years to get big enough to really know for sure.  As I understand it, the main difference from Debaoensis and Multipinnata are the plumosity of the frond.  Like the below picture of Sim Lav holding up a big Debao frond, it is very plumose and overall triangular in shape with tripinnately compound leaves.  Fronds may be up to 4' wide (or so) near the base.  Multipinnata is also tripinnately compound but a more exaggerated triangular shape and not plumose at all...or very very lightly plumose.  The fact that yours have leaves coming off in several different planes means it's extremely unlikely to be Multipinnata.  But it certainly could be a Debao, it'll just take a couple of more flushes to judge. 

I asked MB Palms about the "Debaoensis" seedlings he was selling at the Leu Gardens show.  I have a couple that I bought 3 or 4 years ago, and they are clearly Multifrondis unknown hybrids.  He said that the new ones he's selling are from a sexed pair at a friend's house and he's hand pollinating them.  Here's an example of a Multifrondis hybrid, with bipinnately compound leaves.  This frond (covered in scale) was about 8 feet long.  If it's gotten that big and isn't tripinnately compound, it's probably not going to turn into one. This was an MB Palms plant from 2022, so it may be that his are all Multifrondis too.

 

Yeah i was going to ask sim. I’ve seen the discussions and i typically do not grow many cycas, i obtained 6-8 and they’ve been growing in deep shade. I think with more shade, they’ll tighten up and look fuller. 

[Merlyn]

2 minutes ago, DippyD said:

Yeah i was going to ask sim. I’ve seen the discussions and i typically do not grow many cycas, i obtained 6-8 and they’ve been growing in deep shade. I think with more shade, they’ll tighten up and look fuller. 

In shade they'll stretch out like palms and look more sparse.  My Multipinnata in full shade has the latest frond at least 15' tall, and another from the same batch is in full sun and about 10' tall.  The shade and sun ones look nearly identical, just the shade one is scaled up in all dimensions.  I like both.    Honestly I like all the hybrids too.  It's nice to have one that I can be sure is a Deb or Bifida or other, but all the hybrids are interesting too and unique in many ways.  Like this one from MBC that Sim said is likely a Deb/Segmentifida hybrid.  That's an awesome plant and I'd love to have one like it in my yard:

[DippyD]

1 minute ago, Merlyn said:

In shade they'll stretch out like palms and look more sparse.  My Multipinnata in full shade has the latest frond at least 15' tall, and another from the same batch is in full sun and about 10' tall.  The shade and sun ones look nearly identical, just the shade one is scaled up in all dimensions.  I like both.    Honestly I like all the hybrids too.  It's nice to have one that I can be sure is a Deb or Bifida or other, but all the hybrids are interesting too and unique in many ways.  Like this one from MBC that Sim said is likely a Deb/Segmentifida hybrid.  That's an awesome plant and I'd love to have one like it in my yard:

What a beauty! All mine are still very small as well. 2-3” tops. So still juvenile whatever they are. 

[Gallop]

15 minutes ago, Merlyn said:

In shade they'll stretch out like palms and look more sparse.  My Multipinnata in full shade has the latest frond at least 15' tall, and another from the same batch is in full sun and about 10' tall.  The shade and sun ones look nearly identical, just the shade one is scaled up in all dimensions.  I like both.    Honestly I like all the hybrids too.  It's nice to have one that I can be sure is a Deb or Bifida or other, but all the hybrids are interesting too and unique in many ways.  Like this one from MBC that Sim said is likely a Deb/Segmentifida hybrid.  That's an awesome plant and I'd love to have one like it in my yard:

I agree there are definitely alot of cool hybrids out there. This is what I have as C debaoensis (multifrondis) x C bifida 
and C debaoensis (multifrondis) x tropophylla x mitcholitzi

[Gallop]

1 hour ago, Merlyn said:

@DippyD I'd think that yours is either Deb or Multifrondis hybrid swarm.  The bipinnate bottom stems on the latest frond rule out Micholitzii, but it may take a few years to get big enough to really know for sure.  As I understand it, the main difference from Debaoensis and Multipinnata are the plumosity of the frond.  Like the below picture of Sim Lav holding up a big Debao frond, it is very plumose and overall triangular in shape with tripinnately compound leaves.  Fronds may be up to 4' wide (or so) near the base.  Multipinnata is also tripinnately compound but a more exaggerated triangular shape and not plumose at all...or very very lightly plumose.  The fact that yours have leaves coming off in several different planes means it's extremely unlikely to be Multipinnata.  But it certainly could be a Debao, it'll just take a couple of more flushes to judge. 

I asked MB Palms about the "Debaoensis" seedlings he was selling at the Leu Gardens show.  I have a couple that I bought 3 or 4 years ago, and they are clearly Multifrondis unknown hybrids.  He said that the new ones he's selling are from a sexed pair at a friend's house and he's hand pollinating them.  Here's an example of a Multifrondis hybrid, with bipinnately compound leaves.  This frond (covered in scale) was about 8 feet long.  If it's gotten that big and isn't tripinnately compound, it's probably not going to turn into one. This was an MB Palms plant from 2022, so it may be that his are all Multifrondis too.

 

How often does your multipinnata flush? I just noticed mine is going on 2nd flush of the season and has produced a nice pup which is also flushing. 

Edited September 14, 2023 by Gallop

[amh]

Has anyone identified the NTCHP debaoensis?

[Merlyn]

14 minutes ago, Gallop said:

How often does your multipinnata flush? I just noticed mine is going on 2nd flush of the season and has produced a nice pup which is also flushing. 

I get 1 or 2 fronds per year.  So far all my flushes have been single fronds at a time.  Here's a frond detail from a couple of years ago, it was about 6 feet long at the time in shade:

Sim looked at that photo and this frond (from the next year) and said it was definitely Multipinnata:

There was a new frond to the upper right on that photo, just starting to uncurl.  Here's the same frond way above the roofline:

And here's one likely Multifrondis in full sun, shortly after finishing a 4 leaf flush.  The fronds are all bipinnately compound:

 

[amh]

47 minutes ago, amh said:

Has anyone identified the NTCHP debaoensis?

Pic related.

[Gallop]

26 minutes ago, Merlyn said:

I get 1 or 2 fronds per year.  So far all my flushes have been single fronds at a time.  Here's a frond detail from a couple of years ago, it was about 6 feet long at the time in shade:

Sim looked at that photo and this frond (from the next year) and said it was definitely Multipinnata:

There was a new frond to the upper right on that photo, just starting to uncurl.  Here's the same frond way above the roofline:

And here's one likely Multifrondis in full sun, shortly after finishing a 4 leaf flush.  The fronds are all bipinnately compound:

 

Thanks. IMO C multipinnta is fairly easy to identify as being real or not. Some of the multifrondis hybrids can be more difficult to identify. 

[Gallop]

Caudex aprox 2” on this C debaoensis 

[DippyD]

33 minutes ago, Gallop said:

Caudex aprox 2” on this C debaoensis 

Super cool looking! I pulled mine into more sun this morning… prob need to repot/treat roots since they were blowing out the bottom of the pots 😂🤦🏼‍♂️🤷🏼‍♂️

[Gallop]

13 minutes ago, DippyD said:

Super cool looking! I pulled mine into more sun this morning… prob need to repot/treat roots since they were blowing out the bottom of the pots 😂🤦🏼‍♂️🤷🏼‍♂️

Thanks, yeah pot them up for sure. They can get big quick given the right growing conditions. 

[Gallop]

For comparison C debaoensis (multifrondis) 2” caudex. I was told this plant came from seed from MBC. 

[Merlyn]

1 hour ago, Gallop said:

For comparison C debaoensis (multifrondis) 2” caudex. I was told this plant came from seed from MBC. 

I'd believe it!  That one looks like a younger version of the MBC hybrid I posted earlier.  That'll probably turn out just as cool as your Deb/Tropo/Mich hybrid. 

@DippyD these definitely need bigger pots than you'd think.  I stepped a couple up from 1g to 3g and they had grown a 2" diameter root through the bottom of the pot untold number of feet into the ground.  It had gone through a small drain hole and expanded to crack the plastic pot.  Fortunately that tap root will keep growing if you accidentally crack it off.  I know this because I've accidentally done it several times during repotting or transplanting.  The tap root will get a "constriction step" at the crack point but just keep on growing. 

[Merlyn]

3 hours ago, amh said:

Pic related.

That's hard to say from a closeup picture.  At the very least it is bipinnately compound, i.e. there's a side branch that has "hands" of leaflets coming off of it.  I'm assuming the part you are holding is the main petiole/rachis and not a side branch.  I don't have any of the NTCHP plants, and I haven't read of any positive IDs for them.  It'll probably take a few more flushes before you can say what that plant is.  If you could post a picture of the whole plant that might help narrow it down.

[Merlyn]

3 hours ago, Gallop said:

Thanks. IMO C multipinnta is fairly easy to identify as being real or not. Some of the multifrondis hybrids can be more difficult to identify. 

Yeah, I think for me the big question is "what makes it really tripinnately compound?"  I've seen a few photos where it looks like a "Debaoensis" doesn't really have side branches off of the side branches.  But maybe it's just on a sliding scale.  For example, here's a view of my biggest Multipinnata from the underside.  You can see in the circled spot that the side branch splits off to other side branches, and then "hands" of leaflets grow out of that side branch:

To me that's pretty clearly tripinnate.  The side branches are 6" to a foot long each.  The one below (from CBLisa) is arguably going to be tripinnate...maybe?  It is doing single frond flushes with long side branches, in about 50% full sun and doing 2-3 flushes per year.  It isn't clearly having side branches with hands of fronds off of them, but there might be what you'd consider a 1/2" long stubby side branch circled in red and a green highlight down the center of the lower left side branch: 

But this one from CBLisa is doing 2-3 frond flushes and to me appears to be bipinnately compound.  The "hands" of leaflets are coming directly off of the secondary rachis, without a clear second side branch.  It's also in about 75% full sun, and is just now producing 6' fronds.  So maybe it'll develop the secondary side branches in the next couple of flushes...maybe it won't!  The main rachis I marked with red lines, and a green highlight down the center of the side branch:

I think the two lower photos *might* end up being real Debaoensis, but at the moment they don't have the secondary side branches that are necessary to match the official species description.  But maybe I'm being too fixated on one part of the description and can't see the forest for the trees.    What do you think?