Re: Titan Arum Setting Seed

From: "Julius Boos" ju-bo at email.msn.com> on 2001.12.05 at 01:09:03(7869) Dear Donna and all Friends, Yes, thanks for pointing this out. I GUESS they would have had to remove a part of the male spadix BEFORE it opened, as the female flowers are 'ready' at least a day or two before the pollen is produced, so Donna, do you have any idea exactly how they manage to 'collect' the immature pollen and 'ripen' it?? Cheers, Julius +More >>This is a very interesting story. They used surgical methods to extract pollen and "ripened" it, then pollinated when females were receptive. Normally, Amorphophallus pollen is released only after the female flowers are no longer capable of receiving it. I don't know if anyone has ever tried this with other aroid species, but certainly others will make the attempt now that Huntington has proven it can be done! The folks at Huntington have deployed these methods sucessfully with some other plants (not aroids) and thought it would be worth a try. However, it must not be genetically optimal to self-pollinate in this manner. Donna Atwood<< << I was not aware that the Huntington plant was self pollinated but here is the story: http://www.huntington.org/BotanicalDiv/TitanSeed.htm >>

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