[pbs] oxalis
Mary Sue Ittner
msittner at mcn.org
Sun Jul 6 13:38:54 EDT 2003
Dear Katy,
First welcome to the PBS list!
You will find a number of us here who are very fond of Oxalis in spite of
its weedy tendencies. I have 3 species in bloom right now all courtesy of
Uli in Germany (sent in the past when you could do that without a
certificate).
My experience with Oxalis has been that like many other bulbs I grow that
some of them choose not to come up some years. When I dump the pots, they
are there and look fine. I once asked about Moraeas, what are they doing
down there and Rachel Saunders speculated, "absolutely nothing." Since then
I have dumped pots out where there was no activity and found that quite
often that was true. Other times however (not usually) bulbs had roots and
were growing but never broke the surface. Could they be too deep? I don't
know but remain curious. I am afraid I grow too many things to have kept
track of what has happened to all of those who are sulking or waiting for
conditions more to their liking. Some Oxalis that hasn't come up one year
has the next, but others when examined closely have a hard shell that
encloses nothing.
Do the acorn-like things in your soil look like what you brought back?
Oxalis is very variable in the forms of its under ground storage organ. If
this looks like the same thing you remember you could try to mimic its
natural cycle. Lee Poulsen has plotted some rainfall graphs and I think
there is at least one Mediterranean one here and the link to another source
where you might find the islands:
http://www.ibiblio.org/pbs/pbswiki/index.php/RainfallGraphs
It might come up in the fall as I'd assume it would be winter growing. It
wouldn't hurt to try if it was something you really wanted.
Which ones do you grow successfully inside? I'd think a lot of the South
African species wouldn't get enough light indoors. I know ones I donated to
the Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens where some large trees from adjacent
properties are beginning to shade the area where the bulbs are displayed
got very leggy. I am sure that many of our members would be interested in
knowing what works.
I will be sharing more of my extras with the BX soon and people from colder
climates could try them inside if it would work. One I have a whole lot of
is Oxalis glabra that is blooming in Australia right now. Lyn Edwards just
added her picture to the wiki:
http://www.ibiblio.org/pbs/pbswiki/files/Oglabra.jpg
One of the nice things about her picture is that you can see both leaves
and flowers. So often getting both in focus is tricky and since the leaves
are much more variable than the flowers it is nice to see both (and in one
picture.)
This one produces a lot of very tiny bulbs or are they corms? I think
they'd be too tiny to slice through to find out. You'd think they wouldn't
be big enough to bloom, but they do. We've concluded with as many offsets
as it makes that growing it in a container is the way to go. They might be
weedy in warm climates and wouldn't survive the cold in cold ones.
Mary Sue
Mary Sue Ittner
California's North Coast
Wet mild winters with occasional frost
Dry mild summers
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