Archives: June2009

• Kalanchoe delagoensis

  

  S.Q. Mehdi posted today’s Botany Photos of the Day in our Flickr Pool. Thanks once again to S.Q. for a set of wonderful images. (Original Images)

  Crassulaceae is the fourth largest family of succulent (water-retaining) plants. Structurally, the family is the simplest among succulents, consisting of plants that, in general, vary quite little in quantity of sepals, petals, stamens, and carpels. Interestingly, Crassulaceae is, in spite of this structural simplicity, the most diverse succulent family in terms of habitat and climate tolerance, with the native conditions of different genera and species varying from arid deserts to moist marshes, and endurable climates ranging from searing heat to gelid sub-zero cold.

  Kalanchoe, a genus of about 130 species, consists mainly of flowering shrubs and herbaceous perennials, though it boasts some annual and biennial species as well. The genus is native to Madagascar and to tropical regions of Africa and Asia.

  Kalanchoe delagoensis is commonly known as 'mothers of thousands' and 'chandelier plant'. The species is native to Madagascar, though it is now naturalized in many tropical countries, where it is cultivated as an ornamental. Historically, K. delagoensis has also fulfilled the more practical role of a versatile medical treatment for infections, rheumatism, inflammation, and hypertension. That said, gardeners should note that this power to heal is matched by a power to harm: as many unfortunate grazing animals have experienced, the plant contains poisons (bufadienolide cardiac glycosides) that, if ingested without treatment, induce cardiac arrest.

  The plant—which in today’s photo seems either painted in pastel or molded from dusty terracotta—generally grows to a height and spread of 1 metre. It thrives in sandy soil with abundant water, adorning itself in waxy green leaves and dangling cylindrical flowers of pinkish-brown. The plants are viviparous, meaning that small plantlets are produced on the vegetative tissues (in this case, on the margins of the leaves). These plantlets drop to the ground, spawning the prodigious amount of offspring that accounts for the first common name mentioned above.

  Primary Source:

  Rowley, Gordon. The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Succulents. New York: Crown Publishers, 1978.

• Cardiocrinum giganteum var. giganteum

  

  Just under three years ago, on 3 July 2006, Daniel featured the recently-bloomed giant Himalayan lily, Cardiocrinum giganteum, on Botany Photo of the Day, and aptly referred to the plant as a "hallmark" of the Garden’s collection. In the cool, breezy air of last Friday morning, after passing the towering giganteum stem that still stands in the stairway of our administration building, Tom Wheeler welcomed the plant’s fragrant flowers back into the garden, and recorded the encounter on the film of his camera. Thank you to Tom for sharing today’s lovely photo. Steve Coughlin wrote the entry.

  Cardiocrinum—another herbaceous, bulbiferous member of Liliaceae—is a small genus conventionally split into three species: Cardiocrinum cathayanum, Cardiocrinum cordatum , and Cardiocrinum giganteum. The genus is distributed broadly throughout the sub-alpine regions of northeastern India and Nepal, through several parts of China and northwestern Myanmar (Burma), and into Bhutan as well. Cardiocrinum species generally grow in forests or on hillside slopes, where they excel in a combination of shade, humid air, and moist soil.

  Cardiocrinum giganteum, first collected in the second decade of the 20th century, is native to elevated forests at 1200-3600 metres. The plant’s hollow green stem reaches its apex at a height of 3-5 metres and spreads its large, leathery, and heart-shaped leaves out to a diameter of around 100 centimetres. In mid-summer, an ensemble of large trumpets, creamy-white or green and internally streaked with red or purple-red, unfold from the lengthening raceme. The plants die after flowering, leaving behind small offsets that will flower some 3 or 4 years later.

  Today, the flowers hang quite close together, like members of a swaying choir pushed shoulder-to-shoulder. The fact that they have just arrived combines with our knowledge of their transience to make us ever more attentive to the sweet subtleties of their aromatic melody.

• Jacky Winter

  
  
  I took this photo of a Jacky Winter (Microeca fascinans) while on a recent trip to the Barmah State Forest, Victoria.
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  <br />EXIF: Canon EOS 50D : 1/125 sec : f/5.6 : 400 mm : ISO 200