ABSTRACT:

In my quest to develop new, compact and ornamentally desirable Philodendron hybrids, I was anxious to own and bloom a specimen of P. saxicola. This plant is an attractive, smaller growing Philodendron in the meconostigma group, but is also difficult to grow and tends to grow rather slowly when compared to such wellknown (and grown) plants as Philodendron bipinnatifidum. A few years ago, I was able to germinate and grow my own specimen of P. saxicola (Fig. 1), and in 2013 the plant came into bloom for the first time. My objective was to see if I could develop hybrids that retained the compact and attractive characteristics of P. saxicola while adding ease of cultivation and disease resistance to the genetic mix.