# Pollination success!



## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

Since the cordata 'blassi' was throwing off so many spathes, I tried my hand
at pollination. I've tried before, but this is the only time I appear to have been
successful.










The 'fruit' is about 12 days old.


----------



## Bert H (Mar 2, 2004)

Congratulations!


----------



## AaronT (Apr 26, 2004)

Dude, you just upped the bar big time. 

Did you use pollen you had frozen or haven't you tried that yet?


----------



## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

I did try the frozen pollen on C. pontederfolia but I havent had luck with that. Come to think of it, I didnt have success with fresh pollen on pontederifolia either. 
This was the 2nd attempt on the blassi - the first being with C. pontederifolia pollen


----------



## DelawareJim (Nov 15, 2005)

Sweet! It'll really be interesting to see what germinates. So this is self-pollenation?

You are a Crypt. god! rayer:

Cheers.
Jim


----------



## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

Not self pollination. Crypts have a built in mechanism to prevent that - the first day the spate is open, only the female flower is mature. Day 3ish is when the male flower matures, and by that time, the female flower is done.

I took pollen from a 3 day spathe, cut a window in the kettle of a spate that opened up that very day and pollinated. Two different plants - though they are clones.


----------



## Khamul1of9 (Oct 25, 2005)

Very cool! How long does it take to get seeds?


----------



## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

Khamul1of9 said:


> Very cool! How long does it take to get seeds?


Heh - I dunno - first time. I think its in the order of months.


----------



## Khamul1of9 (Oct 25, 2005)

Did you ever have success with this? I have second Crypt. cordata 'Blassii' spathe about to open and the first is still looking good. So i want to give pollination a try too.


----------



## ddavila06 (Jan 31, 2009)

A-W-E-S-O-M-E!!! good seeing you yesterday, and nice plants you brought, next time give fair warrning to bring money

so now this "fruit" has to like mature and drop to the ground? Congratulations


----------



## supasi (Jul 20, 2009)

Congratulations. 
My Blassi is always putting up spathes so may try it. I attempted it as you did with Becktii a few months ago, no success there. Although I dont think I got the timing right.
This is encouraging me to try it again.


----------



## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

Khamul1of9 said:


> Did you ever have success with this? I have second Crypt. cordata 'Blassii' spathe about to open and the first is still looking good. So i want to give pollination a try too.


The fruit lasted another 15 days or so beyond that picture and then rotted away. I don't know why, but that's as far as I've gotten. I havent given it any more tries, more of my efforts have been with tissue culture lately. However, from my conversations with Niels Jacobsen about pollination, he says the average success rate is about 10% - so don't be discouraged if it doesn't work the first time around, but don't get your hopes up too high either.


----------



## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

supasi said:


> Congratulations.
> My Blassi is always putting up spathes so may try it. I attempted it as you did with Becktii a few months ago, no success there. Although I dont think I got the timing right.
> This is encouraging me to try it again.


Yep - timing is everything with aroids. With crypts, in general, the female flower is only receptive the 1st day the spathe opens up - sometimes only for a portion of the first day. Day 2-3 is when the male flower matures. So you'll need to have pretty good timing to get it to work.


----------



## Yoong (Nov 26, 2007)

Ghazanfar,
Eventhough it didn't seed, at least you got fruit for a while. Congratulation on that. 

When you open up the kettle of the male flower, how do you collect the pollen and how do you dust onto the female flower?

Thanks.

Yoong


----------



## Phil Edwards (Jan 22, 2004)

Congratulations bud, that's awesome! Keep up the good work and do the US proud!

Cheers,
Phil


----------

