This tree is at a friends house in San Diego.It is versicolor pink and is about 15 feet tall.Has tons of flowers but sparse foliage.Still is a sight to behold in bloom.Which it does all year long out there.
Brugie trees how I luv em!!
Eric, I am not going to be able to sleep tonight without dreaming of such a divine tree such as this. I have so much to dream for.. Thank you for the wonderful pictures.
Absolutely awesome.Imagine the seed pods on these trees.:0
Brugcrazy the trees are about 15 years old.
Snowhermit..they don't form seed pods alone without human intervention.
Eclipse, they would in my yard, i guess cause i let the catapillars eat the leaves until they start budding, can't have em eating flowers.
Maybe it's good that I can't grow them that big up here. I'd be up on a ladder for sure trying to pollinate all the blooms and probably fall off and break something.You know after 40 bones just don't heal quite as fast. LOL
OH, that's gorgeous! I think I've seen that on a website somewhere. They had some pics of incredibly huge brug trees! Does your friend have a white one in his yard, too?
Eclipse - isn't that just one of the most beautiful things?
This year I was fortunate to meet a man locally who grows brugs in a tiny back garden like other people grow lettuce - lined up one after the other. A rather smallish man - he'd hate me for saying that, but his brugs are 20-25ft in the ground. Not surprising to you people who leave them in the ground year round, but Bert (who is in his 70s- he'd hate me saying that too)digs these monsters up every November and overwinters them indoors and then hauls them out again in the spring. Rambling here - but when I was given his address I vaguelly knew where it was. I turned the corner and every house on the block had huge brug trees. I knew I'd found Bert. Funny how some things can draw a street together.
Eclipse,
Are you saying that bees don't pollinate this particular brug?
If I am understanding you correctly, you are saying that they have to be pollinated by a person. I guess I am a little confused as to why some have to be hand pollinated and others are pollinated naturally. I am still learning!!!
Me too,wouldn't' the moths get to them?Hummingbirds?
Eclipse, I don't want to step on your toes as I think you are a great hybridizer, but I have found that moths will and bee's will both pollinate Brugmansia in my yard. That is one reason why I have cut back on the named cultivars in my yard. I want to primarily grow and hybridize mixed hybrids with aurea hybrids comprising the majority of the mixture so to speak. I have seen seedpods form on a Brugmansia several houses over when that was the only variety they had as well. I have seen this happen with versicolors, candida's, suaveolens, aurea type hybrids etc. I must confess I don't know how many seeds would actually be from a moth if one opened up the flower while it was still in the calyx and pollinated it...if a moth came along later and pollinated that same flower then I just want to at least be sure it was some aurea pollen that did it. I try to pollinate my Brugmansia flowers befor they emerge from the calyx to circumvent this...but still how can one be sure without protecting the flower from insects altogther....
Glory
Feb 04, 2002
Maybe they don't have those moths out west like we have here. I know all my seed pods this year were pollinated by those little hummingbird moths.
Brugmansia none of my brugs are pollinated except by me.We also have bees and several types of moths here too...go figure.In the wild only a few species ever form seeds naturally and Sanquinea is the only type pollinated by hummers.The flowers are only receptive to pollen transfer for a specific time period ..usuaully the first 3 nights.Once the pollen touches the stigma the pollen grows tubes very quickly down to the ovaries and pollenation is complete.I have never seen any insects other than cucumber beetles in my brugies after 14 years of growing them.so agian ..go figure!!:-) Pollenation usuaully takes place after sundown.
Wingnut..I have let other web sites use some of my pics so its very possible you have seen this pic before. :-)
DANG!!! I need to get some typing lessons..SHEESH! LOL
In my climate - the PNW - the sanguineas do very well. I can't say that I've seen moths on them but I have seen little hummingbird butts sticking out of the blooms. Sorry, is that a bad thing to say?
I just wish that I hadn't been so neat early on in the summer cutting off spent blooms before there was a chance for pods to form.
This is an awesome looking brug, I dont suppose I would be able to get one to grow this big.
Liz, I was just getting ready to order a sanguinea from Native Habitat, just taking my time and thinking about it. I think I have given it enough thought, and will just do it!
This afternoon, I hope (unless I get swamped at work and have to put it off till tomorrow)
Do you still have to bring yours in Liz? Our climate is fairly similar I think.
I didn't get any moths to pollinate mine either. Oh, and I've got to tell you!!! I've got a yellow penduncle and I'm going to pick that puppy tomorrow!! Can you believe I left it alone so I could come home and get my camera and take photos for you guys?? It's STILL hanging on the stem!!
I did good didn't I?
The only pods I've ever had were created by some type of flying critter. I think it had to be the moth. I had eleven pods on one plant and 2 or 3 on the other. Of course, I thought they had to mature in the sunshine, so Tragedy was the only one that I got to grow and it was immature seed when I planted it. I also didn't know that evening was the only time that I need to pollinate. Kyle, do you pollinate more than one time in the evening, or just once an evening for three days?
Brugie, The best time to pollinate is the first evening as soon as it gets dark.The pollen gets dry and ts the most receptive time to cross the plants.The longer you wait the less receptive the plants are.Ages ago the fragrance was what attracted the pollinators in the wild. Many of which are now extint in the natural habitat.You will notice that the scent starts after sundown. Thats the time to cross them. In nature the scent would attract the pollinators at that time too.If you spend a lot of time outdoors in the summer..evenings especially, you will note that most brugs lose their scent shortly after midnight.Few are fragrant more than a few hours each night.The reason was the natural pollinators. Moths are active early in the evenings..not real late into the night.
My neighbors already think I'm nuts what with the big lights in winter and crawling around on my hands and knees trying to water under these things during the summer. We all live on a cliff so there is no gardening privacy. No coffee cup and PJs here. So far I've kept away from the miner's light slug hunting. I shudder to think of what they're going to think when they see me with a miner's light prowling from plant to plant with Q-tips.
I'll just say that Kyle Courtney said this was the way it has to be done - maybe they'll move and let me pollinate in peace.
Liz
I can just see you out there in your miners hat and light with a baggie of q-tips a marking pen and tie on tags!!
Liz...another secret..use a small narrow pointed camels hair paint brush(artists type) and load it up with pollen.after transferring the pollen to the seed parent plant dip the brush in a small jar of rubbing alcohol(it kills the pollen and renders it useless)then wipe it clean with a kleenex and let dry a few seconds before you start all over with another cross.There is method to my madness!!LOL
I bow to the master! Camel's hair paintbrush it is. I'll do whatever it takes - off to the artist's supply store tomorrow so I'll be ready. All I have had blooming is sanguinea (all summer and winter)- I have buds on Bert's aurea and it seems like every big cutting I took of P+C has buds. So there is nothing I can do except collect it and put it in the freezer for now. My Preissel is in the GH - can you cross a P+C with an aurea? The sanguinea to the aurea maybe?
The paintbrush will be so much easier than the Q-tip. I would never have thought of that, and I have all kinds of artists brushes!!
Eclipse,
When summer comes I will take some pictures of the moths and bees swarming into my Brugmansia. I honestly thought the same as you do for a while. Funny, when I saw all those moths swarming about flying into each and every bloom I thought it was hundreds of hummingbirds. As for the bees, the bees are not nearly as bad. It may be that these particular moths are only in Florida. I don't know a whole lot about moths I must confess so I will catch one and post it here. The Isabella seems to attract lots of these moths as well. I personally pollinate all of my Brugmansia long before the flower opens up to insure no insects pollinate them before me. There are other hybridizers that have noticed moths swarming into their Brugmansia as well, but I must confess I have not taken down their geographical location to see if this is perhaps some local moth. The moth that swarms into my Brugmansia can hover and darts very fast when it wants to much as a hummingbird. They do stop and crawl into the Brugmansia though. Bee's are most prevalent in the early morning hours in my Brugmansia. So, it would seem what the Moths don't get to the Bee's will. That is another reason why I completly pull the corolla loose from any flower I pollinate. I planted and germinated several thousand Brugmansia last year, but I only grew 600+ up to 12-15 ft though. Any that do not bloom the first year I cull as early bloomers are what I most seek. I also dry my pollen and freeze it as many hybridizers do. Film canisters are excellent for this type of thing and one can store many qtips much less inexpensively than paint brushes. For immediate use of pollen I simply peel the corolla back and over itself to reveal the anthers and use that as my brush. Of couse if one pulls the corolla off before pollinating it with a flower done this way then there is no fear that any pollen will be mixed. I must confess though I have to use the flower brush so to speak for many hybrids as my wife would kill me if I removed all of our flowers. I don't mind finding out something I previously believed is false if it is indeed so and with as much experience as you have had I don't expect you to believe me. I can say that when I have pictures posted this summer then we can all say that this moth and bee phenomenon is at least true in my yard even if it is not true in any other's yard....At any rate one can use one corolla brush on the same type of flower and then discard to prevent cross pollination with an unwanted pollen.
Taking notes again!!! Keep up the great information Kyle and Eric.
Joydie
Brugman, i have 2 kind of hummer moths, one with a yellow back and one with a clear back. i found a cat eating a young brug last week, left him be. not sure of the kind of bee, but had lots of those too last summer/fall. i only had one plant that didn't get a seed pod--one of your white Xs that i shovel pruned and is now happily growing new stems from the upended roots. found first pod first part of augus on one of your Xs, then everything else got pods. some plants set pods on almost every flower after that. i liked the way you pollinated culebra, which i am very sorry to say lost all pods, probably my fault, which was to take off the pollen anthers and put straight on the stigma of the mama... i did pick up some make up brushes at a yardsale to use.
anyway, florida brugies, you can count on your brugs being pollinated by something if you aren't using insecticides that kill bugs.
i had given an isabella to a garden friend, then in september gave her a couple more, one with a bloom. i found a seed pod on her isabella..guess it came from that little bloom....
I can't swear to it Arlene, but if I remember correctly the moth or humming moths as I have grown accustomed to calling them have a bit or red or orange on them. Just a few tiny splotches. Those things move so fast its hard to even distinguish that they are indeed moths and as I have only seen them at night...heck I called you up ecstatic that I had hummingbirds flying into my Brugmansia. I must confess that as Arlene is in Florida perhaps that moth only lives in Florida. Anyone else seen moths flying in droves to pollinate their Brugmansia? I have heard reference to these moths being called sphinx moths or something similar if memory serves me. Perhaps a search on the web will bring something up. With as many Brugmansia as I had blooming last year I had countless moths flying in each night. The kids were really amazed as was the wife. It was really embarrassing when we realized we spent several hours looking at moths though when we had thought they were hummingbirds. Reminds me of an eagleduck...but thats a different story....
we have them too, and I didn't realize last year that I was killing the cats that grow into these.
Don't be embarrassed that you liked them!! They are cool little buggers.
what's an eagle duck????
lol, you are cracking me up. i see the hummer moths during the day too. first one i saw spent about 20 minutes on the deck at a purple fountain in full bloom. i have never seen a herd of them, you may have caught them migrating or something? no clue. but i watched those ugly cats eat my brug leaves and saw them occasionally at dusk. my brugs start smelling before dark, at least some of them CG for sure.
Glory
Feb 05, 2002
That moth also live in South Mississippi....and it seems they don't show up here till around July or August. I have a friend that had 14 pods on her Brugs this year and never pollinated the first flower....as a matter of fact she had no idea what those pods were hanging off her Brugs.
My Mom also had a few pods on her Brugs and I know she doesn't know how to pollinate Brugs. LOL
Tig,
An Eagle duck is when you get passers by to look at the beautiful eagle by the lake shore. When a sufficient crowd has surrounded the eagle the eagle gets up and waddles off...clearly a duck. Lol, quite embarrassing really. But as they say it wasn't the first time and it won't be the last...so I have hummingmoths and eagleducks to look forward to.
This message was edited Tuesday, Feb 5th 10:52 AM
ROFLOL!!
Glory
Feb 05, 2002
Brugman....that was cute. LOL
Glory, they didn't get active here until august either, not sure what kind, know there are at least 2 kinds here. i had blooms from may on, no pods until august.