I am a TOTAL newbee at gardening... I have been inspired by a wonderful Amaryllis my friend gave me this Christmas. Not sure what type of Amaryllis this is... It is the standard reddish/pink with five blooms coming from the top of the stalk. The AMAZING thing is that once it bloomed, faded & dried up, a totally NEW stalk grew and bloomed five more fabulous flowers! Now I want to 1) Nurture the original bulb so it will bloom again next year. 2) Self pollinate it for seeds. I have some questions surrounding these goals: Did the plant bloom twice because the bulb was some sort of "twin"?? 2nd stalk came from the same bulb as the 1st, but from a 2nd area at top of the bulb. Is that common? I have never seen this before, and neither has my friend who is more into gardening than I have been. If I nurture the bulb, should it happen again?? What is the best way to handle the original bulb once the Amaryllis has finished blooming, so it will bloom again. How soon will it bloom again? Next year, or does it skip a year? Should I take it out of soil or let it keep growing?? No idea how to do this... HELP! To self pollinate, do I take some of the pollen on a Q-tip and get it onto the stamen in the center of the pollen bearing stalks? I've read Mymimi43's comments about the blossom end swelling to indicate that the pollination takes, but how long do you let that happen and how do you harvest seeds? I'm sorry I am so unversed in this but I find it fascinating! Figure if I have some success with this, I'll try something more exotic! Thanks Mymimi43, Hans-Werner and Lora!! Holley PS. Photo is of the plant's first set of blooms. This post was edited by KiwiLuv on Sat, Feb 8, 14 at 15:29

I wish the places in Japan would export...the one company has some wonderful plants.....Hippis and otherwise!! Rick, get some H. striatum or H. puniceum (species that will bloom in a 4 inch pot easily from a bulb 1 inch in diameter) or if you like tiny hybrids how about H. 'Mrs. Garfield' as this one will bloom from a bulb the size of a quarter. There are many others, but I am drawing a blank for whatever reason. Ask at Glasshouse Works for small Hippis like these as they have them. I just sent out all my H. striatum seed from this blooming so do not have any to give or would happily provide you with this weed. I'm sure you can find a few small ones :o) Dan

No one is against taxonomy and nomenclature, they are a MUST. I know there are rules that applies, but the "by the book" attitude that prevailed then and now is very sad and VERY WRONG, whatever the reasons are to support such a closed up mind attitude. It is not because there is a book that analysis, common sense and judgment shouldn't have a place in the room of decision, which was not really the case as we understand history today. The "bunch of uneducated people" were mostly very renowned scientists, botanists, taxonomists, person who discovered species, persons who first described a species and the location where it was found, even persons that gave their name to some species. These peoples were just as well informed and educated as their opponents if not more. Gosh sometime I wish I was that uneducated!!!... (: This is most certainly not the first and only taxonomy mistake that was ever made by some nomenclature scientists. There is nothing wrong in admitting that there could be a mistake, have a serious and in depth analysis made and may be change their mind. No need to change historical facts, just take into account the reality of then and now, make a very good analysis of what is involved, use good old common sense and above all sound judgement, and why not write a new page in history? There could could be others solutions to this problem as well, but keeping the hard line is NOT one that is acceptable. But of course, there is nobody that oversees what is going on in this field, except KAVB, which IS the one supposed to play a very big part, but what do they do? All they do is register new Dutch Hybrids almost exclusively while they are supposed to deal with the whole world in the whole amaryllis field. If you visit their site, it is in Dutch only. How inviting!... So let's keep the strict by the book attitude, and in 20, 50 years, peoples of then will still be fighting to implement the word "hippeastrum" without much success as it has been the case for many decades (7?) now. Everybody will be a looser, only the poor short vision scientists of the past will be the winners. Open up our minds, lets have a second look at the things, put some analysis, common sense and judgement, and everyone can win, in less than 5 years, the subject will only be a bad memory. That change was a short vision and very sad mistake. There are better solutions than saying: we are wrong, we know we are wrong, we will not change, so deal with it. Got to go, I have to water my amaryllis now! Laurier

Sorry, I was being lazy on my earlier post... I looked it up for you. It's Lycoris squamigera, a member of the Amaryllis family. Some other common names are Resurrection Lily, Magic Lily, and Naked Lady. They're very common around here. Unfortunately, I have none currently, but I loved them when I was a kid, and am always watching for them to pop up this time of year. They just appeared a couple of days ago. My kids have a great time scanning everyone's yards for Naked Pink Lilies each summer.