Date: Monday, July 06, 1998 9:19 PM
Subject: Re: The Origin of Alocasia 'Black Velvet'
>> I have been curious about Alocasia `Black Velvet' for some time: in
fact it is one of the things I was hoping someone might be able to
send me a preserved specimen (even a leaf) of, so that I could put a
species name to it.
The name does not appear in the index of Burnett's account: have I
missed something?
Alistair Hay<<
Dear Alistair,
I have been attempting to forward my letter to Elke Seubert (which she did
not answer) to your url, and there must be a problem of some sort (it may be
me, as I`m not that good on the computer as yet), but the post master keeps
returning the post as "Nondeliverable mail", no matter how carefully I type
in the address that is above your posts to me or the Aroid-l group. You do
seem to receive my mail if I punch the "reply to sender" button on my
computer, as I am presently doing.
Any ideas on what could be wrong, or do you have a less complicated address
to which I could forward mail?
I will be answering your letter to me re: the seed paper soon.
Sincerely,
Julius
ju-bo@msn.com
ju-bo@msn.com
alistair@rbgsyd.gov.au
______________________________ Reply Separator
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Subject: The Origin of Alocasia 'Black Velvet'
Author: at mailgate
Date: 7/6/98 8:05 AM
Geoffrey and All,
Alocasia 'Black Velvet' is a cultivar I named circa six years ago. I
got it from the Lyon Arboretum, Hawaii. I don't recall what they called
it, and I gave it what I thought to be a catchy commercial moniker. The
Lyon purportedly received it from a collector in
Japan. From there the origin becomes murky. The legend I pass on is
that a Japanese orchidologist discovered the species while botanising
for orchids in Borneo. The orchidologist either collected a single
individual or only succeeded with cultivating one individual as I have
only seen the clone A. 'Black Velvet' in collections and in tissue
culture production (http://www.agristarts.com). The orchidologist kept
the attractive plant's origin a secret for fear of over collection, wild
population descimation, habitat destruction, etc. There is an image of
a tetraploid clone of A. 'Black Velvet' that I selected from a tissue
culture population some years ago at
http://www.mobot.org/IAS/Hort/Tculture/abkvvt.html . You can probably
find another yourself as the tissue culturing seems to produce many of
these.
Maybe Dr. Hay can give us a species name for this stunning Alocasia. By
the way, it is one of many stunning Alocasia species that are described
very nicely in David Burnett's Aroideana edition Vol. 7, 3-4 "Cultivated
Alocasia", http://www.mobot.org/IAS/bk-issue.html .
Best Regards, Scott
Scott Hyndman
Winter Park, Florida
USDA Hardiness Zone 9a
scothynd@magicnet.net
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