From: "Julius Boos" ju-bo at msn.com> on 2005.04.05 at 14:45:40(12835)
Dear Friends,
I need your help on this one----fairly recently there was a post when it
seemed like just about every Botanical Garden was having a Amorphophallus
titanum coming in to bloom, and most of the discussions were about the
availability of matching pollen, the chilling/freezing of pollen, etc.
This particular post, however, described a method whereby the male flowers
of this particular single bloom were dissected and the unripe pollen
collected, something was done to mature this pollen prematurely, and then a
few days later, when the bloom opened and the female flowers were at
anthesis, the prematurely gathered and 'artifically' matured (?) pollen was
applied to the female flowers, thereby actually succesfully doing
self-pollination to this one RARE bisexual bloom, I believe that viable seed
were produced using this method!
For those less informed, a bisexual aroid bloom (like all species of
Amorphophallus, Caladium, Xanthosoma, etc.) usually has the female flowers
receptive upon opening, and a couple days/hours later, only when the female
flowers are dry and no longer receptive is the pollen produced, this
strategy is thought to prevent self-pollination, not a 'good' thing in most
cases according to mother nature.
OK!!!!!! I need some kind soul to send me this method, or to research the
IAL mail archives and PLEASE re-post send me this information!
Thanks in advance,
Jullius
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