Growing Lachenalia

GROWING LACHENALIA

I decided to concentrate on growing lachenalia as they are very suited to pot culture and don’t grow very big – okay for my small back yard. They are happy growing close together and look best that way. Most species come from the West Cape area in South Africa, which has cool, damp winters and dry summers. As we can have summer down-pours it is therefore best to put pots under cover after the leaves have died down, and before Christmas. The pots can be retrieved in autumn, and the few early flowering ones before the rest, as they may start to make roots and shoot, even when the soil is dry. Give one good watering, and then not another until shoots appear. As the weather can still be quite warm in autumn, the pots are probably best in semi-shade.

Only a few species are available here as bulbs: aloides forms, particularly quadricolor (yellow & red), bulbifera (red), mutabilis  (best forms with two or more colours on stalk), and contaminata (white) and maybe viridiflora (turquoise blue). A couple of specialist bulb growers may offer a few other species. So to build a collection means obtaining imported seed, and nearly all available species are on the quarantine allowed ‘seeds for sowing’ list. Seed takes at least two years to flowering stage: I have found three years, so as Fermi de Sousa said, once you start sowing some seed each year, then you begin having a succession of flowers to look forward to. This last year I had glaucina (syn. orchioides var glaucina), mathewsii and thomasiae flower for the first time. They were respectively blue, yellow and white. 

Seed generally germinates well, but in the first season one only gets small grass-like stems which don’t grow very big. It’s probably best to keep the little plants growing as long as possible, by giving some weak liquid fertiliser (high in potassium) and moving the pots to semi-shade when the weather warms up. The little bulbs that form are so small that it is best to keep them in the same container for the next season as well. This means selecting the compost carefully.

Lachenalias come from poor soil areas, so no rich compost is advisable. I mix up commercially available bulb, bonsai and cactus & succulent composts, which are sterile, and therefore no weeds should appear. They are free draining. Topping with a thin layer of sand helps to keep the moisture in and allows one to see the emerging seedlings easily. As the seed is quite small, I put it on a white saucer and slide off seeds to the tamped down compost surface with a finger, just to get the seed evenly spread. The pots need to be kept moist, and having a layer of sand means watering from the top is okay, otherwise, water from the bottom. Sow seed from about mid March until May.   

Someone alerted me to the use of aspirin water with plants: 1½ soluble aspirin to 4½ litres of water, with a little mild liquid soap so that spray sticks to plant surfaces. Aspirin contains salicylic acid, which stimulates plants’ natural immune system to pests and diseases. As lachenalia can be attacked by virus, spraying with aspirin water may well help. Watering with aspirin water has also said to have markedly improved germination of seed. Worth a try.

Obtaining suitable pots for flowering size bulbs may not be easy. There are squat terracotta pots about 18 cm wide readily available, but they are much heavier than plastic and dry out more quickly. Sometimes it is possible to scrounge a few similar plastic pots where nurseries have recycling bins: I go to CERES in East Brunswick and Bulleen Art and Garden. I have been lucky enough to get smart terracotta lookalike pots at a stand at the Melbourne International Flower and Garden Show. It is usually located in the far Rathdowne St side stands – sells gardening clothes etc. 

Geoff Crowhurst

Lachenalia Mathewsii