The Variegated Thumb

I’m happy to announce that the MidAmerica chapter of the International Aroid Society (IAS) will be having their second meeting at the Missouri Botanical Gardens (MOBOT) in St. Louis, Missouri on April 24th.  The MOBOT has one of the largest research collections of Aroids in the world, the largest herbarium, beautiful outdoor gardens and the world famous Climatron tropical conservatory.  The MOBOT is one of the largest botanical gardens in the country and well respected by other botanical gardens worldwide.

All plant enthusiasts are invited to attend the events of April 24.  You don’t have to be a member of the IAS or even know what an Aroid is.  (If you like plants, then you probably know a bunch of different plants from the Aroid family, but just didn’t know they were related.)

We have a full day of activities planned, but you can just attend half, if you would like.  Here are a couple of highlights:

• Dr. Thomas Croat will be giving two formal presentations on his research with Aroids and will also be leading tours of the herbarium, greenhouses and the MOBOT grounds.
• Joep Moonen will be in town from French Guiana and will be talking about the Aroids of South America and particularly the collection of the Roberto Burle Marx estate.
• Steve Lucas will be talking about how he maintains a tropical rainforest in northwest Arkansas.
• Steve Marak will talk about growing temperate Aroids outdoors in our climate.
• We will also have a plant trade.  Bring cuttings or plants you would like to share with others, if you have any.  If not, you just might be going home with something anyway.

This is a meeting you will not want to miss!  If you are in the area, be there!  If you are within 6 hours of driving, I would encourage you to consider driving over for a long weekend in St. Louis and see some of the other things St. Louis has to offer.

It’s going to be a great meeting.  Here’s the tentative agenda:

Opening Gathering:
8:30-9:30 AM. Coffee

Opening: 9:30 AM A review of Systematic work with Araceae in the New World. Thomas B. Croat, Missouri Botanical Garden

10:15 AM Coffee break

10:45 AM     A preview of the Philodendron from some arid areas of Brazil and a visit to the Burle Marx Collection in Brazil, Joep Moonen, Emerald Jungle Village, French Guiana.

11:15 AM    Missouri Botanical Gardens Grounds Tour. This tour will concentrate on some of the grounds near the Ridgway Center since at least some of us will return there for lunch.

12:15 PM    Lunch break

Opening of Afternoon session:
1:00 PM     An introduction to aroid genera, Thomas B. Croat, Missouri Botanical Garden

1:45 PM    Cultivating tropical plants efficiently in a temperate environment, Steve Lucas, Siloam Springs, Arkansas.

2:15 PM     Cultivating Aroids outdoors in a temperate area.  Steve Marak, Springdale, Arkansas

2:30 PM    Coffee break and plant swap and give away

3:00 PM     Tour of Missouri Botanical Garden Aroid Collection

3:45 PM      Tour of Research complex at Lehmann Building herbarium. This will include seeing the world’s largest collection of herbarium specimens, demonstrations on the use of Lucid, a session at the CATE Araceae site at Kew and an explanation of Croat’s research efforts with revisionary and floristic studies.

4:30 PM         Refreshments

5:00 PM         Adjournment for dinner (any who would like to meet at a restaurant)

If you think you might be able to come, I would appreciate an RSVP so we can have the right amount of space and refreshments.

Stay update by visiting the MidAmerica chapter website.

I have been collecting Aroids for about a year now and just recently joined the International Aroid Society.  Upon joined the IAS, I promptly began forming a local chapter.  The MidAmerica chapter of the IAS had our first meeting on November 21 at the Myriad Botanical Gardens in Oklahoma City.

Myriad Botanical Gardens in Oklahoma City - photo courtesy Dr. Tom Croat

The first meeting was a small gathering, but still included two members from out of state.  Dr. Tom Croat of the Missouri Botanical Gardens attended.  He is one of the premier researchers in the family of Araceae (Aroids).  Steve Lucas is a collector and the creator of www.exoticrainforest.com, a wonderful enclosed “rainforest” in northwestern Arkansas.  Another member of the IAS, Russell Gaines, attended who is a resident of Oklahoma City.

MidAmerica chapter group (Janice Lucas, Brad Lucas, Russell Gaines, guide Kenton Peters, Zach DuFran, Christie DuFran, Cheryl Ponder, Dr. Tom Croat, Ron Ponder, Steve Lucas) - photo courtesy Dr. Tom Croat, taken by innocent bystander.

The meeting consisted of a wonderful tour of the Myriad Garden’s conservatory, which houses thousands of tropical and succulent plants.  The tour was supposed to last an hour but went much longer than that.  Kenton Peters was a very patient and enthusiastic guide, telling us about the many living treasures in the Myriad’s collection and also asking some questions of the group members with expertise in Aroids.

Group surveying the wonderful Anthuriums.

After the tour was complete, we had a short sit down meeting where we exchanged some plants and cuttings that Steve and Dr. Croat had brought to the meeting.  Dr. Croat brought plants from the MOBOT which were collected in the rainforests of Central America.  Each plant is tagged with an accession number, which can be used to look up the collection notes on the Tropicos website.  The notes will include a description of the plant in the wild, a description of the terrain and vegetation where the plant was collected and the latitude and longitude coordinates so that you can look up the exact location on a map.

Discussion and plant trading after the tour.

Steve has a wonderful collection of beautiful tropical plants and brought cuttings of about 8 different plants.  Steve is currently working with Dr. Croat to write the scientific description of a plant which is thought to be a newly discovered species of Philodendron.  Steve bought the plant from a seller (Ecuagenera) at the 2009 IAS Show and Sale in Miami.

The meeting, while small, was a great success.  I think that all attendees really enjoyed the Myriad Gardens and had not even heard of it before.  Clearly, the Myriad Gardens is under-promoted.

Dr. Croat gave some of the plants to our tour guide, Kenton Peters, so that they could be added to the collection of the Myriad Gardens.  We’re hoping that, as a group, we can help boost the collection of Aroids at the Myriad.  Already, there is a nice collection of Aroids, with some very nice specimens of large and beautiful Anthuriums (one pictured above).  However, some plants are mis-marked or not marked at all.  I plan to start volunteering at the Myriad Gardens next week.  Kenton says that I might be able to help him with the bonsai collection and will begin my work by helping to prune away or pick up the dead leaves.  This might sound like menial work, but I can’t wait to spend a day in the gardens, working among the  plants.

More pictures from the trip are posted on the IAS website.  See them here.

The next meeting is scheduled for Saturday, April 24th at the Missouri Botanical Gardens (MOBOT) in St. Louis, Missouri.  Dr. Tom Croat will give a talk about his research and will also lead a tour of the research collection of Aroids housed at the MOBOT.  We’re aiming to have a much larger gathering at this meeting.  All plant enthusiasts are encouraged to come and enjoy this time of discussion and discovery!

I ran across a local-ish nursery called Taggert’s in Hennessey, Oklahoma.  It’s a bit of a drive from here, but I was passing by on a recent visit to Enid.  It is a wonderful nursery that specializes in succulents and cacti.  I found a lot of neat little odds and ends plants that I was not at all expecting in this small town nursery.  Beyond the succulents and cacti, there were some really nice, small tropical plants.

Streptocarpus saxorum or False African Violet

Christie found a flowering plant that she couldn’t pass up.  And it adds some nice color to my otherwise green-only greenhouse.  It is a relative of the African violet (Saintpaulia sp.) often called a “False African Violet” (Streptocarpus saxorum).

Streptocarpus saxorum bloom

I found a small Aroid that was not tagged with any name.  After asking a worker, I realized I would have to find the id myself for this probable hybrid.  As best I can tell, it is likely to be in the Syngonium genus.

Unidentified Aroid, possibly from the Syngonium genus.

The leaves are velvety and very dark green with a prominent white center vein.

Any ideas on what it might be?

The week before Thanksgiving I added about 15 new plants to my collection.  That’s the mark of a good week, in my opinion!

The smallest of the plants I received - Vanilla planifolia, the vanilla orchid.

Alocasia brancifolia

It started off when I received a box of five very small starter plants I had purchased on eBay: Vanilla planifolia (Vanilla Orchid), Olea europaea (Olive Tree), Alocasia ‘Aurora’ (Pink Stem Elephant Ear), Alocasia brancifolia, and Alocasia ‘Stingray.’  The Vanilla orchid is the actual plant from which the vanilla bean grows and vanilla extract is taken.  I don’t expect to be harvesting from my plant, as I hear it is quite hard to even get them to bloom in cultivation.

Olea europea - common Olive Tree

The same is true for the olive tree I ordered.  I just love the look of the olive tree, though.  I am hoping to grow it to a nice specimen size that I can keep in a large pot.

Alocasia 'Stingray'

Amydrium zippelianum

Next, I received two plants from a friend who collects rare Aroids: Amydrium zippelianum and Philodendron tortum.  These are two really cool plants!  The tortum looks like a palm tree, but what would be a frond of many leaves on a palm tree is actually just one leaf on this Philodendron.  The leaves are just very deeply lobed.

Philodendron tortum

On the Saturday preceding Thanksgiving was the first meeting of the MidAmerica chapter of the International Aroid Society, a group which I have been forming and coordinating.  I’ll post more about that event in the next week.  Two members that came to that meeting brought cuttings and plants to share.  Steve Lucas brought me cuttings of Philodendron camposportoanum, Philodendron billietiae, Philodendron bipennifolium, Philodendron verrucosum, and an unknown Philodendron.

Philodendron camposportoanum

Philodendron bipennifolium

Philodendron verrucosum

Dr. Tom Croat brought small specimens from plants he collected in the wild in Central America: Anthurium holmnielsenii, Anthurium sparreorum and Anthurium verapazense.  These plants are very unique, because they have their assession numbers on the tag, which allows me to search the Tropicos database to see exactly where Dr. Croat collected these plants and what notes he took about the environment where he found them growing.

Philodendron NOID

Dr. Croat looked at the unidentified cutting above, trying to determine at least what genus the plant belonged to.  After tearing the leaf at one point, he noticed what appeared to be fibers at the edges of the tear.  He explained that in Monsteroid plants, there are silicate crystals inside the leaves.  This could mean the plant was from the Monsteroids.  However, after a couple of minutes, the fibers that looked like silicate crystals began to droop, indicating that they were not crystals, but actually just latex.  This indicates that the mystery plant is from the Philodendron genus.

It was a wonderful weekend that resulted in lots of potting!

My wife and I took a short road trip on Sunday to visit a nearby church where one of my good friends is now the associate pastor.  On our way back home, we happened to pass one of my favorite local plant stores, TLC.  (No, really, I didn’t realize we were going to be driving right past it.)

Anyway, as you can guess, we stopped in to see what they had.  I kept mental notes of plants that were on my “want to buy” list and then, after seeing the whole store, decided to purchase one of them.  The plant I chose is an Alocasia which I had never seen before and was right up my alley.

Alocasia lauterbachiana

Alocasias are one of the genera that are commonly called as “elephant ears.”  Well, some of them are.  I would be surprised if anyone called this particular plant an elephant ear!  Other genera that use the “elephant ear” common name are Colocasia and Xanthosoma - and maybe a couple of others.  Colocasia and Alocasia are often hard to tell apart, but I have recently heard some good ways to tell them apart.  Alocasias almost always have stems that attach to the edge of the leaves, while Colocasia stems usually attach in the middle of the leaf.  This leaf attachment is known as peltate.

close up of Alocasia lauterbachiana leaves

Alocasia lauterbachiana has beautiful leaves that are dark green on top and purple underneath.  The leaves are quite long, slender and lance-shaped, pointing upwards and they are marginally-attached.  That is, the stem that holds the leaf attaches at the edge of the leaf.

While this is the more common way for Alocasia leaves to be attached, some Alocasias have peltate leaves like most of the Colocasias do.  Some notable peltate Alocasias are A. cuprea, A. clypeolata and A. rugosa.  I’m planning on posting soon on the anatomy of plants from the Aroid (Araceae) family.  There is quite a bit of vocabulary that is unique to this family.  My post would include vocabulary referring to leaf structure, parts of leaf, as well as the unique “blooms” of the Aroid family.

I have read that this plant is sort of sensitive and does not like to be repotted or moved around much.  I will be moving it into my greenhouse next week, assuming all goes well, and it should be content in its stable growing environment.