[Aroid-l] Alocasia Poly

From: ExoticRainforest <Steve at ExoticRainforest.com> on 2009.11.18 at 16:39:12 Just a note regarding Alocasia Poly, or a some call "AlocasiaPolly". I've been trading mail much of the morning with Bill and DenisRotolante. The team own Silver Chrome Gardens near Homestead, FL andare the growers that found and popularized Alocasia Poly. The plant isnothing more than a smaller form of Alocasia Amazonica and not fromdifferent parents as I had been informed. Some sources indicate André's "mortefontanensis" may be the same as thehybrid plant now known as "Alocasia Polly" which is correctly AlocasiaPoly. Some sellers have elected to use the wrong name but according toBill Rotolante this smaller version of Alocasia Amazonica wasdiscovered in their nursery. Most seller's tags today give credit tothe Rotolante's. This is a quote from one of Bill's notes: "I was growing Alocasia xAmazonica back in the 1980's from tissue cultured liners. One of theplants exhibited new characteristics; heavier leaf substance, shorterpetioles, better shipping qualities and slower growth than the standardplants. It was a sport from the standard Amazonica type created bygenetic changes in Tissue Culture. The rest is history. It became thestandard of excellence in Alocasia for many years. It's still hard tobeat although the value has been degraded by the fact that it was overproduced by Chinese labs that flooded the market with knock offs." The name "Poly" originated since they originally thought their smallervariation was a polyploid form of Amazonica Amazonica. A polyploidspecimen is one that has more than double the basic number ofchromosomes. DNA tests on the plant have proven this assumption to beincorrect. Part of the problem in understanding Alocasia species is theyare extremely variable across any given range. A species collected inMalaysia may not appear to be the same plant id collected in Sumatra.Plants have been studied where only a single specimen of its "type" canbe located in a large area while others that appear to be only somewhatsimilar are commonly growing around the region. If studiedscientifically all prove to be the same species. A single plant thatdoes not look exactly like its parent group does not indicate a newspecies. Alocasia species are so variable in the wild there is no wayto compare them to cultivated specimens. Growers and sellers are fartoo quick to want to grant a new "name" to a plant based on a singlecultivated specimen.--------------050507000006010000030608

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