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East London Bromeliad Society South Africa October 2017 Page 1

Our aim is to promote and encourage awareness and interest in Our aim is to promote and encourage awareness and interest in Our aim is to promote and encourage awareness and interest in Our aim is to promote and encourage awareness and interest in Bromeliads in East London and all of South Africa!Bromeliads in East London and all of South Africa!Bromeliads in East London and all of South Africa!Bromeliads in East London and all of South Africa!

A really super, relaxed, informative and well

attended September meeting was held on

a lovely Spring day at the home of Dr Boots

and Alison Horsfall in Vincent Heights with

their lovely sprawling gardens. A perfect

venue for the meeting and for our guest

speaker, Christo van Wijk, one of our country

members from Pretoria, to present his talk on

Hybridising, Culling and Registering

Bromeliads. Thank you Boots for providing all

the equipment necessary so that Christo

could just plug in his flash stick and go! You

just have to love technology! And thanks to

Alison for the innovative screen, which

worked extremely well and both of you for your warm and welcoming hospitality. Boots is fairly new to

collecting bromeliads and he has amassed a lovely collection so far. Most were arranged in the front garden

under a huge fig tree which will provide some shelter from our soon to be blazing hot sun! His Tillandsia

collection is mounted on a trellis on the patio wall on the other side of the house. I can see it’s not going to

end there, more coming soon!

Our speaker for the meeting was Christo van Wijk who arrived from Pretoria with his partner Willie du Plessis on

Sunday morning. Lyn fetched them from the airport and brought them to the meeting. Dr Peter Pfister hosted

them for their two night stay in East London and Pete squeezed in a visit to Bonza Bay Beach for Willie and on

Monday they also visited, besides Lyn and Pete’s gardens, the gardens of Dudley Reynolds, Barbara and

Eddie Black and Brenda Wegner. When I asked how he got interested in broms: “I was given an Aechmea

fasciata by my Grandma when I was in hospital with a broken leg as a young

teenager, on being told that I must keep the cup filled with water I was

fascinated…… the bug bit” and he had to find

out more about this amazing looking plant.

Christo started collecting from anyone he knew

had bromeliads, his friends moms etc. and most

of us know how brom crazy he is today. Thanks

for sharing your bromeliad knowledge and

experiences with all of us Christo!

Hybridising, Culling and

Reg is te r ing B romel iads

presented by Christo van Wijk

• It all starts with a dream…..

• Choose the plants you want to hybridise: The

seed parent usually carries the shape, and/or

ELBS is an Affiliated Society of Bromeliad Society International

East LondonEast LondonEast LondonEast London Bromeliad Society

South Africa Established: 25 July 2009

NEWS LETTER

October 2017

Dr Boots and Alison Horsfall and part of his growing collection of super bromeliads.

Christo van Wijk and Willie du Plessis.

Right, Neoregelia ‘Leopard Queen’ and

Neoregelia ‘Milagro’ (albomarginated).


variegation pattern, the pollen parent usually carries

size, spines and growth habit. An albomarginated

(white on the leaf edge) Neoregelia can usually not

be used as a seed parent. As in this case I would use

Neoregelia ‘Milagro’ as a pollen parent

(albomarginated) and Neoregelia ‘Leopard Queen’

as the seed parent.

• Remove the pollen from both parents at around

7am when the flower buds have just opened. Keep

the pollen you want to use, and discard the rest.

There will be 2 stems of pollen (stamens) attached to

each flower petal, they can easily be pulled off with

some tweezers, and it can be placed on a clean

sheet of paper to dry.

• The pollen can be stored for up to 2 years in a clean

container with some dry rice or silica gel added,

store the container in the fridge. Label Clearly.

• Pollen is then removed, showing the stigma in the

centre of the flower at the top of the picture. At

about 9 am the stigma should be sticky, and the

pollen can be transferred onto it with a fine brush or

an ear bud.

• Cut a small marker from any thin but sturdy plastic in

a sharp triangle shape, about 2cm long and 6mm

wide. I use the Syntex labels.

• Mark the pollinated flower by pushing the marker

down into the flower right next to the stamen until

you feel some resistance, it needs to fit securely into

the cavity.

• Write down what cross you made, it takes a while for

the seed to ripen and you WILL forget what the cross

was, I write it with a permanent marker on the leaf of

the seed parent, the cross ALWAYS gets written with

the seed parent first and the pollen parent second.

• Wait for the seed to ripen, this can take 3 weeks to 18

months, so regular inspection of the crop is required.

• When the seed is ripe you will usually see the

change, in the case of any of the Bromelioideae

group (Aechmea, Billbergia, Neoregelia,

Orthophytum, etc..) you can pull on the ‘fruit’ gently

and if it’s ripe it will come away easily, the fruit will

sometimes have a different colour now too. In the

case of the Tillandsioideae family, the hard brown

capsules will start to split on the end (Vriesea,

Tillandsia, Lutheria, Goudaea, Catopsis, etc.) and

the same with the Pitcairnioideae group (Dyckia,

Puya, Pitcairnea, etc.)

• In the case of the Bromelioideae Group the seed

can be squeezed out of the berry fruit and onto a

clean piece of parchment, let it dry to make sowing

easier. The other two groups have dry seed, so the

capsules can be broken open and the seed

extracted and sown directly, (if the capsules

haven’t fully opened already).

• Bromeliad seeds need light to germinate, so they

should not be covered to exclude light. I use flat

seedling trays, with composted bark, but really any

flat container and any well draining mixture with no

fertilizer or chemicals added will do.

• A brace is needed so the cover doesn’t lie on the

seed. I cut strips from 2L coke bottles, but wire works

Label the plant with

the details.

About 3 months later and ready for the first

cull if the goal was to get variegated

plants. You can see some varigation in the

close up photo.

S e e d l i n g s

transplanted into

128 division trays.

Removing the pollen. Allow the pollen to dry. Storing pollen.

Squeeze the seed

Transferring the pollen. Making markers. Marking the flower.

Wait for seed to ripen. Extracting the ‘fruit’.

Germinating the seeds in flat trays covered

with a ziplock bag.


just as well when bent in

an arch shape. Cover with

a zip-lock bag and leave

the trays in a well lit

location.

• About 3 months later the

seedlings are ready for the

first cull if the goal was to

get variegated plants.

They should show signs of

variegation already and

the plain green ones can

be removed with tweezers.

Photo on the right shows

the variegation up close.

• The chosen seedlings can

now be planted into 128

division trays, with a good and well draining

potting medium (substrate), fertilizer can be

added at this stage to make them grow a

bit faster, but I don’t use any.

• They grow fast! About two months later

they are double the size.

• After about six months they should be

ready to be transplanted into larger 24

division trays, time to cull all the unwanted

seedlings again.

• About a year later they can be re-potted

into 12cm pots, again… culling the

undesirable seedlings.

• One to five years later the potential

should be clearly visible and the

unwanted plants can once again be

culled … keep only the best of the best, if

any.

• The photo above right shows in my

opinion, good hybrid siblings.

• The photo far right shows unstable

variegation, (only on one side) these will

be culled….

• Right, twelve Vriesea made it to the final

selection out of about 2000 seedlings.

More will be culled… yes… the green

ones.

• Far right, a perfect plant, in my opinion, in

flower and ready to be registered. (I did

register this one as Neoregelia ‘Kyleigh

Kriek’, named for my sister’s daughter.

• Right: To register your plant: Go

onto the BSI website, click on

‘New Registration’. Fill out the

form, and press “submit”, another

page will then open where you

can submit photos of your plant:

one photo from above, one from

the side, and a close up of the

flower (if it is interesting enough to

be noted). You are now done!

And it only took 1 to 12 years !!! Photos and article - Christo van Wijk

In my opinion these are good hybrid siblings.

Unstable variegation,

these will be culled.

A perfect plant in my opinion, which

I have registered. as Neoregelia

‘Kyleigh Kriek’, named for my niece.

Twelve Vriesea hybrids made it out of

out of about 200 seedlings.

1 - 5 years later the

potential is becoming

visible.

They grow fast!

Variegations can be

seen in some. Time

to cull again.

After 6 months they are

ready to be re-potted

again.

A year later re-potting

into 12cm pots and

culling again.


Library - Brenda Wegner There are some interesting topics worth reading appearing in Volume 66(2): 65 - 128 of

the Journal of the Bromeliad Society April – June 2016

• CONFERENCE CORNER – The planning of the 2018 World Bromeliad Conference to

be held in San Diego is well under way. The venue is the fantastic bayside resort

Paradise Point.

• GENERAL – BSI66 Fund update by Rick Ryals and Lyn Wegner.

• SCIENCE – A new species of Cipuropsis, and some remarks about this recently

resurrected genus.

• IN THE WILD – In Honour of Franz Georg Gruber (Part 1): In search of a very special

bromeliad: Goudaea ospinae var. gruberi Luther written by Peter Tristram. It is all

about Peter’s amazing adventures in Colombia exploring to find two Goudaea

ospinae varieties in habitat.

• IN GENERAL – The BSI 2016 Financial Report.

• The search for Irish Bromeliads by Jay Thurrott.

Member News • Our very sincere condolences to Tracy and Robert Moss on the death of Tracy’s mom, on the 9th October.

Many of you will remember her well from being on the till at Pioneer Nursery for many, many years. We are

thinking of the family and Christopher, Tracy’s brother, as he deals with his own health issues too at this sad

time.

We have three members opening their gardens for the Pam Golding Gardens of

East London Garden Show this year to be

held on the weekend of the 11/12th

November, Larraine Parathyras, Dudley

Reynolds and Elna Smit, who are busy

preparing their special gardens right now in

readiness for this annual event. I am sure

the bromeliads and tillandsia in these

gardens will blow visitors away! Another

wonderful opportunity to promote bromeliads in our community! There

will be 25 gardens in total that you can go and visit. All you have to do is

buy a ticket for R50 and support your favourite charity to enable you to

see them all!

Thanks • Dr Boots and Alison Horsfall for hosting a really super meeting.

• Michael and Zena McClaren and Larraine Parathyras for eats for tea

time.

• Pete Pfister, Eddie and Barbara Black for Lucky Draw plants.

Congratulations to the September Raffle

Winners • Miriam Kennard chose an unnamed Neoregelia.

• Glen Reynolds chose Aechmea blanchetiana variegated

• Val Nel chose Neoregelia ‘Margaret’ for her daughter Caryn Dunlop's

winning ticket.

• Eddie Black chose Billbergia ‘Hallelujah’.

• Christo van Wijk from Pretoria won 2 plants, he chose Billbergia 'Esther'

and Tillandsia streptophylla

• Adele and Beurich from Cape Town chose Neoregelia 'Brown

Recluse'

• Richard King from Darling chose Neoregelia 'Running Red River'

From the Committee • At the meetings members appreciate Lucky Draw and give-

away bromeliads which we rely on members to supply. So if

Some of our raffle winners for September,

Miriam Kennard, Val Nel and Eddie Black.

Neoregelia ‘Running Red

River ‘ Neoregel ia 'Brown

Recluse'

Great to welcome visitors to the meeting, Left

and right, keen bromeliad enthusiast Tony

Manthe and Karin, centre Gavin and Sandy.


you have any to spare, do bring them along to the meetings.

• Members are welcome to sell plants or other items after the meeting but

PLEASE ensure that you put your name clearly on your ‘box’ so shoppers

know who to pay. Collecting payment etc is your own responsibility.

• Breath of Life Garden: ELBS has donated 10 stepping stones towards one

of the new bromeliad gardens at Breath of Life. Just a reminder, they are

at 2 Dawson Road in Selborne and are open for tea every Wednesday

from 10 until 2. There is no charge but a small donation is appreciated.

They will gladly accept any bromeliad donations. This will be one of the

25 Pam Golding Open Gardens.

• The committee have realised that the society needs to invest in a

projector and screen to further enable our presenters at meetings to use

digital resources to illustrate their talks, it’s called keeping up with the

digital age! The proceeds from this year’s auction will be put towards the

purchase of a projector and screen. It’s not too early to start preparing and saving for your auction

donations and bids at the November end of year function!!

Upcoming Society Events 29th October: Val Nel and Caryn Dunlop at 2.00pm at 4 Fuschia Street in Vincent Heights.

Topic: Blooming Broms! Members are all invited to contribute to the meeting by bringing any blooming

bromeliads you have in your garden. Let’s make it a bumper blooming afternoon!

Please remember to bring your chair if you want a seat.

26th November: Brenda and Bryan Wegner in Nahoon Valley. End of year Christmas Auction, BBB Surprise and

Bring and Braai Function.

January 2018: Elna Smit in Gonubie

February: Esther Botha, Elna’s twin sister who lives on a farm, Adelsicht Farm 1337 Schafli road Chintsa.

March: Elna Smit’s farm garden, Kransig Farm Upper Kwelega.

BSI Matters - Lyn Wegner The BSI Officers, Directors and the Standing Committees are expected to submit annual reports of

their activities. It is very interesting to know what these people are doing and wonderful that they

make time in their busy lives to voluntarily do so much for bromeliad enthusiasts all over the world.

I have permission from Geoff Lawn, the BSI Cultivar Registrar, who is kept very busy adding all the

new hybrids and updating names as they change on the BSI Cultivar Registry to share his Report with you.

You might like to go into bsi.org and have a look at the BCR (Bromeliad Cultivar Register) if you are not

already familiar with it.

These are some of the comments from Geoff’s Director Report which I found interesting and I’m sure you will

too. For interest sake I will e-mail the full report to you separately.

1E: Registrations were received mostly from Australia (especially Queensland and New South Wales), New

Zealand, Hawaii, Costa Rica, Germany, Thailand, South Africa. As before, the areas proportionately with

the highest number of growers/ breeders and BSI affiliates - Florida, Texas and California, percentage-

wise register the least.

1F: Most populated genera of registered new cultivars and new accumulated totals: Neoregelia (6796),

Vriesea (1610 - predominantly in the Glyph Group), Billbergia (1992) and Tillandsia (1119).

Upcoming International Conferences 2018: World Bromeliad Conference to be held in San Diego, California from 29 May to 3 June 2018. Check out

the Conference Corner at bsi.org for more information. This will be the third WBC that will be held in San

Diego, California. Registration for the 2018 conference has already begun. If you are interested in going,

contact Lyn Wegner for more information.

2019: ‘Golden Broms’ 17-20 October 2019 Hosted by the Gold Coast Succulent and Bromeliad Society Inc.

at the Sea World Resort on the Gold Coast. This will be the 20th Australasian Bromeliad Conference. For

contact information go to the conference website at www.goldenbroms.com

2021: The New Zealand Bromeliad Society has recently confirmed that they will be hosting the bi-annual

Australasian Bromeliad Conference again in 2021.

Right: One of the newly established

bromeliad gardens at Breath of Life.


From the Editor Many thanks to Christo van Wijk and Willie du Plessis for their visit last month

and Christo’s down to earth and illuminating talk and slide show on

Hybridising, Culling and Registering of Bromeliads at the September

meeting. It went a long way to enhance my understanding of this topic.

Your wonderful enthusiasm and love of rare plants is contagious, much

appreciated Christo!

After some decent rain we have had so far this Spring, everything has

started greening up after a very loooooong and dry period, Aechmea and

Vriesea are sending out spikes and even some of my Cryptanthus are

putting out their delicate little flowers. Neoregelia are colouring nicely,

maturing and putting out their beautiful little gem like flowers in their centres

and so much more to love. We truly are all besotted with a wonderful genus

of plants. So much variety and beauty to choose from to bring pleasure to

our lives, plus a fair amount of scratches and bleeding too from the spiky

monsters! I have a Vriesea hieroglyphica sending out a flower spike right

now, a first for us and so exciting! Every bromeliad garden needs one! The

topic of the next meeting is Blooming Broms! So do bring one of your

current beauties along to the meeting on Sunday, or, if it is too big to bring

along, send me a photo via Whatsapp or e-mail and I will include in the

next newsletter. This is not excluding country members, please send yours

too!!!!!!

The Pam Golding Gardens of East London Show is coming up in two weeks, I

know that many of our members participate in visiting as many gardens as

they possibly can over the weekend it is on, (yes we are crazy! Lol!), I

certainly do on the Saturday and then take Eddie to the best on the

Sunday, and all in aid of charity. We must be very proud of our members,

Larraine Parathyras and Dudley Reynolds and Elna Smit who are busy

prepping their gardens for show. What a wonderful opportunity to

showcase bromeliads to the East London community of garden lovers!

Please support our members, worthy charities and this ‘feast for the eyes’

annual event!

Apologies for the newsletter being hugely delayed this month due to me

having too much of a good time since before the last meeting! I have been

away twice, we had visitors and we also had our eldest granddaughter to

stay for a week on her first solo holiday away from her family. Loads of fun

was had, plus she was happy to potter in the garden a bit in the afternoons,

cutting dead stuff and pottering and drawing graffiti with big chalks

everywhere outdoors. We had so much fun but there came a time after over a month of minimal time spent

in our garden, when I started feeling as if I was getting ‘garden withdrawal symptoms’, I needed to get out

there, get dirty and look after and enjoy my bromeliads! So after much here, there and back again we are

home and getting back to normal, see you at the meeting on Sunday, don’t forget to bring a blooming

brom! Happy bromming!!!

[email protected] 072 1787 421

This is a publication for the East London Bromeliad Society, South Africa for the interest of its members.

Articles may be used by non profit societies with acknowledgement to the author where applicable and East

London Bromeliad Society South Africa. Please use the photos that accompany the article used. If you

require higher resolution photos please request them from the Editor.

Any opinions expressed in articles are not necessarily those of the Society.

When submitting items for inclusion in this newsletter, please ensure that all information, including spelling is

checked and accurate.

Dr Pete Pfister, far right, hosted Willie and

Christo during their whirlwind stay in East

London last month. He also took them to

see a few members gardens. It was

great to welcome them to our garden

too!


ELBS is an affiliate of the Bromeliad Society International.

ELBS Address: c/o 18 Wentworth Road, Sunnyridge, East London 5201 South Africa,

[email protected]

We meet on the last Sunday of every month, January to November, at various venues around East London.

We have a topic for each meeting and Show and Tell where members are encouraged to bring along their

brag or problem plants. There are member raffles, lucky draws for those present, tea time, library and

member plant sales, plus a monthly newsletter sent out via e-mail only. Visitors are always welcome and can

attend three meetings before they will need to join the society in order to continue attending. Annual subs

are R120.00 for individuals/families and R60 for students.

Peter Cook from Sunnybroms (Australia) has very kindly created a link to ELBS newsletters on their web page.

https://bromeliadnewsletters.wordpress.com/east-london-south-africa/

You can access:

• All the back copies of the 2016 and 2017 ELBS Newsletters

• The first of the BSI BCR genus changes and cultivar changes generated via DNA studies complied by Derek

Butcher the BSI Cultivar Registrar.

You will find ELBS on Facebook: [email protected] or type ‘East London Bromeliad

Society’ into the fb search bar. You can request to join the group and will then be able to upload your photos

and comments on the wall. The ELBS SA page and other bromeliad related sites are becoming a useful and

informative forum to share and ‘meet up’ with other like-minded bromeliad folks. There are also many other

bromeliad related sites that you can join and become part of a world wide online sharing environment.

You can view most of all the bromeliads mentioned in meetings or in the newsletter at the following websites:

The BSI’s official Bromeliad Cultivar Registry www.registry.bsi.org which is maintained by Geoff Lawn, the BSI

Cultivar Registrar. Plus other information regarding the Bromeliad Society International is found at bsi.org

Florida Council of Bromeliad Societies: fcbs.org This is a very useful site to reference many bromeliads where

you can clarify identification or just trawl through the site and add to your wish list!

Encyclopedia of Bromeliads - http://bromelia.club (Bromeliad Taxonomists and Growers Society) has

photographs. It also now has keys for the genera and sub-genera. If you like to be informed what is

happening, just follow on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bromeliadsencyclopedia Just type in

‘Encyclopeadia of Bromeliads’ into the Facebook search bar.

For internet resources you can also go to TAXON (The New Bromeliad List) for the most authoritative and right

up to date list of genera and species, accepted and new names and taxonomic keys - http://

botu07.bio.uu.nl/bcg/taxonList.php or just type in ‘New Bromeliad Taxon List’, it's much easier!

Committee Members

Chairman: Dudley Reynolds 079 488 2360 [email protected]

Vice- Chairman: Dr Peter Pfister 082 625 5533 [email protected]

PRO & Secretary: Lyn Wegner 043 736 1737 082 970 2293 [email protected]

Treasurer: Lynn Friend 043 748 2271 083 318 1179 [email protected]

Editor & Publisher: Barbara Black 043 7212775 O72 1787 421 [email protected]

Proof Reader: Lyn Wegner 043 736 1737 082 970 2293 [email protected]

Raffles: Lyn Odendaal 043 726 1075 083 441 6813 [email protected]

Librarian: Brenda Wegner 082 743 2141 [email protected]

Catering Co-ordinators: Eddie Black and

Larraine Parathyras

043 7212775

043 726 3167

082 5505 347

082 594 4559

[email protected]

[email protected]

Events Co-ordinator: Brenda Wegner 082 743 2141 [email protected]

Additional member: Betty Heunis 073 226 1610 [email protected]

Photo Credits: Christo van Wijk, Barbara Black, Lyn Wegner.

east londoneast london - bromeliad newsletters...paradise point. • general – bsi66 fund update...

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