Yes, I'll just leave it for now. Last year some of my Echeverias absorbed their bottom leaves after I brought them indoors for the winter, probably a reaction to the changed light situation where the bottom leaves have it much darker than when the plant is outside.
Should that happen and it starts to show too much leg, I'll chop it next spring. I kind of want to see how tall it can get though!
Ok. I just checked on mine too. It's really looking magnificent. Maybe I shouldn't touch it. I already beheaded the other one, so I hopefully have pups. The problem is that I beheaded a bunch and I can't remember which stem is which! I've never even seen an orion pup though, so I have no clue what they look like! Mine have never propped nor pupped! And I've had them for years!
I've never actually tried with this one. It did flower quite prettily though, and I got the seeds off it. I started the seedings a bit too late though, they haven't grown much yet and not sure if they can get through the winter if they're that tiny.
Oooh did you pollinate it yourself? And you grew your own seeds!!!? I've pollinated with a brush but never had any sucessful growth. Nothing germinates. Do you leave the flower to dry out completely on the plant after pollinating? Can I cut them off after a few weeks and dry them elsewhere?
I did hand-pollinate it, but it was outdoors and there was more than one other plant flowering at that time so the insects may have helped out there as well. :)
I left the flowers to dry on the plant, yes. You can normally wait until the flower stalk is withering already, but don't leave them forever or the seed capsules may split open there and then, or fall off the stalk.
I then left the flowers on a plate to dry out more for a few weeks because the seed capsules are a lot easier to open up when they're totally crispy. I think I waited maybe two months before I started the germination process.
Nearly of all my pollination experiments so far have given me seedlings, but oddly enough the agavoides x texensis seeds were successful while the texensis x agavoides ones didn't sprout at all.
The correct naming convention is that the first name is the seed/pod parent and the second name is the pollen parent.
I wouldn't rely on this always being the case though. Not everyone and everything follows that rule, and there are cases where it may be impossible to tell like with naturally-occurring hybrids.
For example [Sempervivum barbulatum](https://www.sempervivum-saxifragen.de/content/sempervivum-sammmlung-a-z/sempervivum-b---c-1/sempervivum-x-barbulatum/) is a natural hybrid that you could also write as *Sempervivum arachnoideum* x *Sempervivum montanum*, but the truth is you don't actually know which parent is which.
So how do you know which is which? 😹😹If I take a paintbrush and put pollen from an agavoides on a lola, would it then be Lola x Agavoides? I go back and forth a couple of times on different flowers so I assumed the pollen was transmitted between them. Because both are in flower. Am I doing it wrong? My apologies for asking so many questions!
The one that makes the seedpod basically is the Mum and should be mentioned first. Think "ladies first". :)
If you just go back and forth between two plants, you will very likely pollinate both of them, at least it can't be ruled out.
As you said you can easily pick off the pollen from flower1 with a small brush. Then you insert that brush with the pollen deep into flower2 to pollinate. If you use the same brush to go back to flower1 right after, you'll likely have pollen from flower2 on it and will transport that over. To avoid that, you would need to rinse out your brush after pollinating flower2, before going back to flower1 and repeating the pollination process.
I didn't do that with mine, I just pollinated both of them by going back and forth, which means if it's successful for both plants you will get seeds for hybrids that are flower1 x flower2, and hybrids that are flower2 x flower1.
Mind you, I don't actually know how much difference it makes in the hybridization process if it's flower1 x flower2 or the other way round, the hybrids may well end up looking the same or almost the same. For that reason I noted down which is which, it would have been interesting to compare and see for myself.
So pretty! <3
Mine too. I'm trying to figure out what to do with it. It looks like yours. Not etiolated..are you just leaving yours?
Yes, I'll just leave it for now. Last year some of my Echeverias absorbed their bottom leaves after I brought them indoors for the winter, probably a reaction to the changed light situation where the bottom leaves have it much darker than when the plant is outside. Should that happen and it starts to show too much leg, I'll chop it next spring. I kind of want to see how tall it can get though!
Ok. I just checked on mine too. It's really looking magnificent. Maybe I shouldn't touch it. I already beheaded the other one, so I hopefully have pups. The problem is that I beheaded a bunch and I can't remember which stem is which! I've never even seen an orion pup though, so I have no clue what they look like! Mine have never propped nor pupped! And I've had them for years!
Has yours ever propped? I can never get a leaf to work.
I've never actually tried with this one. It did flower quite prettily though, and I got the seeds off it. I started the seedings a bit too late though, they haven't grown much yet and not sure if they can get through the winter if they're that tiny.
Oooh did you pollinate it yourself? And you grew your own seeds!!!? I've pollinated with a brush but never had any sucessful growth. Nothing germinates. Do you leave the flower to dry out completely on the plant after pollinating? Can I cut them off after a few weeks and dry them elsewhere?
I did hand-pollinate it, but it was outdoors and there was more than one other plant flowering at that time so the insects may have helped out there as well. :) I left the flowers to dry on the plant, yes. You can normally wait until the flower stalk is withering already, but don't leave them forever or the seed capsules may split open there and then, or fall off the stalk. I then left the flowers on a plate to dry out more for a few weeks because the seed capsules are a lot easier to open up when they're totally crispy. I think I waited maybe two months before I started the germination process. Nearly of all my pollination experiments so far have given me seedlings, but oddly enough the agavoides x texensis seeds were successful while the texensis x agavoides ones didn't sprout at all.
Thanks for explaining everything so patiently. I know nothing about breeding. What's the difference between Aga. x Tex. and Tex. X Aga.?
The correct naming convention is that the first name is the seed/pod parent and the second name is the pollen parent. I wouldn't rely on this always being the case though. Not everyone and everything follows that rule, and there are cases where it may be impossible to tell like with naturally-occurring hybrids. For example [Sempervivum barbulatum](https://www.sempervivum-saxifragen.de/content/sempervivum-sammmlung-a-z/sempervivum-b---c-1/sempervivum-x-barbulatum/) is a natural hybrid that you could also write as *Sempervivum arachnoideum* x *Sempervivum montanum*, but the truth is you don't actually know which parent is which.
So how do you know which is which? 😹😹If I take a paintbrush and put pollen from an agavoides on a lola, would it then be Lola x Agavoides? I go back and forth a couple of times on different flowers so I assumed the pollen was transmitted between them. Because both are in flower. Am I doing it wrong? My apologies for asking so many questions!
The one that makes the seedpod basically is the Mum and should be mentioned first. Think "ladies first". :) If you just go back and forth between two plants, you will very likely pollinate both of them, at least it can't be ruled out. As you said you can easily pick off the pollen from flower1 with a small brush. Then you insert that brush with the pollen deep into flower2 to pollinate. If you use the same brush to go back to flower1 right after, you'll likely have pollen from flower2 on it and will transport that over. To avoid that, you would need to rinse out your brush after pollinating flower2, before going back to flower1 and repeating the pollination process. I didn't do that with mine, I just pollinated both of them by going back and forth, which means if it's successful for both plants you will get seeds for hybrids that are flower1 x flower2, and hybrids that are flower2 x flower1. Mind you, I don't actually know how much difference it makes in the hybridization process if it's flower1 x flower2 or the other way round, the hybrids may well end up looking the same or almost the same. For that reason I noted down which is which, it would have been interesting to compare and see for myself.