Tuesday, May 22, 2007

Flowering Lophophora jourdaniana

One of my Lophophora williamsii v. jourdaniana plants flowered last week. I’m hoping the early flower can be seen as a promise for more flowers this season – last year and the year before last the plant only displayed one flower.

Flowering Lophophora jourdaniana
Flowering Lophophora jourdaniana

The sun was obscured by clouds most of last week and consequently the flower never unfolded completely before it withered. The picture above shows the flower at its peak – it’s still beautiful in all its rose-violet charm, but for comparison you can check the fully unfolded flower from last year in all its splendor.

Spent Lophophora jourdaniana flower
Spent Lophophora jourdaniana flower

6 comments:

  1. It's amazing the difference a sunny day will make. Have you ever tried to use artificial light to get the blooms to open? I just obtained some jourdaniana seeds. How long did it take to get the first flower? Were you able to self-pollinate last year's flower?
    Thanks for the blog and photos!

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  2. Hi, I have some very mature specimens of Lophophora Williamsii, one with 13 heads.

    Great blog, loads of tips.

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  3. awesome blog man!!!!!
    I dig it....
    BTW could you please lemme know ur mail ID ....i have some questions

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  4. Regarding artificial light, I’m sticking to the minimalist approach – the plants have to do with what light they can get from the sun. Also, I’m growing most of my plants in window sills – reluctantly accepted by “she who must be obeyed”, installing grow lights would cause severe problems ;-)

    I have to admit I “cheated” with my Lophophora jourdaniana plants; they are not started from seed but bought from Uhlig Kakteen in the fall of 2004. I received two 3.5 cm (~1.4'') plants, one of these started flowering one year later and has been flowering each year since, the other hasn’t flowered yet. The main head of the flowering plant is still less than 4 cm (~1.6'') wide, but it has grown a lot of offshoots.

    I probably didn’t succeed in self-pollinating last year’s flower as no fruit has appeared yet. Off course it’s too early to be absolutely certain, but if the flower was pollinated successfully I would have expected a fruit by now.

    Dunx, do you have any photos of your plants? I’m always interested in seeing how others are growing their lophs.

    Leelayz (and others who might be so inclined ;-), you can contact me at lophophora [dot] blog [at] gmail [dot] com.

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  5. jourdaniana seeds?I don't think so.They don't seed.I asked people at 'Cactus Heaven' years ago about seeds for this plant. I was told that they don't seed and if you look at Cactus Heavens seed list you will not find these.

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  6. I only have a few jourdaniana in my collection so my experience with these plants is limited. I agree they are reluctant to seed and in my experience they are completely self-incompatible (a couple of attempts to self-pollinate my L. jourdaniana plants are the the only controlled pollination experiments I've made with them). That being said one of my L. jourdaniana plants set fruit once, a fruit containing only two fully developed seeds, though. I' don't know what plant supplied the pollen (probably one of the neighboring williamsiis) and I don't know if the seeds were viable (because of the "unknown father" and the limited amount I tossed them in my bag of mixed seeds).

    Regarding the availability of seeds, Gerhard Köhres (one of the greatest authorities on Lophophora in my book) offers Lophophora jourdaniana seeds on his list. The seeds are relatively high priced - maybe an indication of Lophophora jourdanianas unwillingness to seed?

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