Re: Comparisons

>Maria,
>
>In what ways did you find hybrids from Black Velvet Rose unsatisfactory?

I should have added 'for my purposes'.  BVR doesn't easily throw its black
center, preferring to make seedlings with large, pale soft leaves.
Naturally a lot depends upon  the other parent, but I've used it a lot and
have only one specimen I haven't discarded: a dark dwarf with soft pinkish
red double blossoms: B.V. pollen & seed parent a miniature formosum  from
Urchin x (my) Star Pink which latter was by landlady's nameless d.dwarf x
Purple Heart.  I use Purple Heart every time I can get pollen from it and
will continue to cross it upon B.V.R. and everything else.

>
>The black blotched leaf is tempting to work with, of course, but some of my
>potted specimens, now approaching two years old (1) are not very
>free-branching
>(that is, there seems little budding energy low on the plant -- but it
>could be
>that I am not feeding them enough or pinching deeply enough);

Yes it's quite stretchy.  I just cut mine back to near soil level except
for one blooming stalk which has fertilized seeds developing on it.
I don't like plants that need pinching to maintain their shape - another
quality to keep in mind when hybridizing.


(2) have poor
>petal retention -- I have yet to get an umbel all in flower at the same time.

Yah!  Petals all over the floor like a wedding!  Scanty pollen production
too, you have to jump to catch it in time.


>It's probably a matter of culture, but as I think has been mentioned here
>before (or on the Yahoo! group), the zone does not uniformly reach to the
>center of the leaves in my specimens, like in the catalog picture.  If anybody
>has advice how to maximize the "black," I'd like to hear it.

I planted two packets of seed from Vesey's and saved the one seedling with
the blackest leaves.  The seeds are quite variable in dark leaf expression.
It does need very good light to maintain the black but I was lucky to get
one showing no green at all in center.
(However last winter during short days a small green center became visible.)


>Best regards,
>
>Barry

You bet!
           Maria






>
>--- maria guzman <mirror@3RIVERS.NET> wrote:
>
>> including Black Velvet Rose - which only rarely produces a halfway
>> satisfactory hybrid for me but I keep hoping) is proving more interesting
>> than I ever thought it would.
>>
>> Maria
>> Augusta, MT
>>
>
>
>
>
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