Posted by Tom Broome on 7/29/2008, 9:15 pm, in reply to "Re: Cycad growth (or lack there of)"
64.12.117.67
--Previous Message--
: Yeah, that was me on the other board
: but, I'm afraid I missed your
: response.
: I'll water it a little more than I
: have been especially since I've
: fertilized it recently. On a recent
: trip to a nursery I saw a large,
: beautiful Dioon edule and it really
: sparked my interest cycads. Ever
: since then I've been researching
: info on cycads. Your site has alot
: of the detailed data that I was
: looking for. Thanks again, Tom!
:
Yea, one of the things I don't like about that board that after 3 pages, your post is basically gone. I guess if you remember the title of your post you can bring it up from the archives, but I tried to find it for a while yesterday and couldn't bring it up. I guess it doesn't matter now, but the main thing was that I said you were making a mistake if you were getting ready to use the Osmocote to try and force out a flush.
I know what you mean about seeing a nice plant and getting thrilled with growing a new plant group. In 1988 had already started a nursery, but that year I saw a Marcozamia communis in a Japanese display garden and there was something about it that sparked my interest. My interst in cycads went through phases, but after readin a cycad book written by Cynthia Giddy, where she talked about how cycads are endangered and the things that people can do to save them, that was it, and that was my start of doing something serious with cycads. In a way, that is one of the reasons why I spend my time helping other people with THEIR cycads in the evenings on the computer. BEing ion a zone 8, you are limited to the species you can have outside, but I have the same problem. Even though I am in zone 9, I have had lows of 21 and 22 for the last 3 years and 17 for the low in 89'so I know how to deal with cold too. Dioon edule is a good cycad to be interested in. You might have fun exploring some of the different forms. Some have reddish emergent leaves, some bluish and some green. Some cluster pretty quick and some grow tall trunks that don't produce as many offsets. If you are interested and send me your e-mail address, I'll send over a picture of my big edule cluster that has been estimated to be somewhere between 300 and 400 years old.
You can also grow a few of the ceratozamias like hildae, kuesteriana, latifolia, and mircostrobila, to name a few and there are others you can grow as well.
If you have any questions along the way, feel free to write in. You can be sure that you will get the right answers to cycad questions on this BB and many times, I can add a perspective that most posters on other forums just don't have.
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