Nothing compares to this....and better yet: a Dyckia.

[Constantino]

Dyckia gloriosa

Species!!!

Native to Santa Catarina!
The rarest Dyckia of all!!
It is an only one!!!!!!!Can not be any rarer.
Non described yet bur under description
Narrow and long protraded leaves.
Spines are far apart for each other.
Magnificent colored year around!
Flowers are spectacular and open fully.
Self fertile. It is capable of making its own self seeds.
Under leaves are white silver contrasting wonderfully with
the red wine like upper surface of the leaves.
Besides all this it is a Dyckia what means won´t perish nor sucumb after blooming. Here it is getting itself ready for blooming.
Astonishing gorgeous dazzling beautiful and Dyckia!

[Paul S]

Constantino - I absolutely love your pictures and don't even mind the poetry.

I have a question, though - if that is the only one that exists, how come it lives in a pot in your collection?

I have another question - in your opinion, which Dyckias have the greatest tolerance of cool but damp growing conditions, with a low temperature of maybe -5C during winter and perhaps 25mm of rainfall a week during the winter months?

[Constantino]

This plant Dyckia gloriosa rubra was with four other plants (green ones) as a cluster on a rock outcrop here Northeastern Santa Catarina Uphills. The land was being prepared to be sold to make several week-end leisure small farms. The exact area was tottaly disrupted. The plant would have being destroyed before even being known. The plant is a miracle itself. I now have seeds from the green ones and the rubra too. This is not enough genetic material to assure its survival as a species in wilderness but we will try.
When a plant grows close to a town or a village it is in a greater risk than those amid nowhere. The was surviving under a small bonsai like bush on the rocks. I do believe this to be one of the most beautiful plants ever seen here.

Concerning to your second quenstion all the Southern Brazilian Dyckias may take cold to or down to -8 degrees centigrade. The point is for how long. We are used to frozes and even some occasional snow but never on frequent schedulle. Just a few brief hours each time.
Dyckia gloriosa takes cold easily, Dyckia reitzii, Dyckia monticola, and many many others.
But please do not get fooled they stant cold they do not enjoy it! Keep happy plants not survivors.

Poetry is the most beautiful way of writting and remember this is a task even for those who is used to the language in a dayly basis. I live in Brazil, we speak Portuguese. I am in love to these alluring plants nothing more natural than showing this that way. Science may be nice looking too.

Dyckia are a new frontier and maybe the last one in horticulture as orchids and cacti, for instance, are all well known and there no more rare cacti. It may be rare in wilderness but they are all cultivated by the million around the world. Dyckias are still to be known and studied deeply. They are alluring and come in every size possible and every imaginable color and every shade and hue in between . Many are well resistant to coldness but they are all tropical no doubt.

If you live on a place where the temperature gets down to +5degrees centigrades for more than 12 hours each time I strongly recoment a heated area in order to maintain healthy and happy Dyckia plants.
Here where I live and maintain more than 160 Dyckia species and more than 60 hybrids rains a lot and the air is constantly saturated to the most. Dyckias are all fine all under the stars even those from Central Brazil.
Some time it rais nonstop for more than a whole month here and here are Dyckia home!

Please take a good look at this.
http://dyckiabrazil.blogspot.com/


This beauty below is Dyckia splendens
Native to Santa Catarina it takes cold way down close to -20 degrees centigrates but just for a very few hours.


Dyckia reitzii(below)
This is the Dyckia plant that can not just stand but enjoy some cold.
It grows only in the highest areas here in South.
Exactly where the type form plant came we registered the lowest temperature in Brazil up to now
in Morro da Igreja-Urubici, Santa Catarina. It was something like -18 degrees centigrades.
But even so this plant likes a more dignifying temperature and grows pretty well here in Joinville where rarely freezes.



The temperature Dyckias enjoy are exactely the same those you like yourself when in T-shirt, bermudas and sandals.

thanks for writting
Cheers.

[Paul S]

Constantino - many thanks for such a useful post.

I had never before heard of these dyckia species and now have reitzii, splendens, monticola and gloriosa to seek out and try to grow. I imagine my best success will be to try and find seed as I doubt many of these plants are even grown in collections in Europe, let alone available commercially. Do you know of any seed sources within Brazil?

For me the pleasure is in growing plants outside, not as potted plants, so I try to keep expanding what might be possible. Currrently I have a hybrid called 'Maurice Hobbs', the species velascana, remotiflora, chaguar and a couple of unknown spp growing outside successfully (thirving!), with a couple of new hybrids and species planted this year. I would love to try as many as I possibly can - largely for reasons that you underline about their worth as cultivated plants. They are interesting, pretty, colourful and unusual additions to the xeric garden, for sure, and take up far less real estate than puyas!

[Constantino]

People offer some seeds once in a while but one must be extreme carefull here as Dyckias interbreed easely. There is no source of genuine Dyckia species seeds all over the world! Collectors keep their plants altogether and produce no relyable seeds. This doesn´t mean there is no striking jewels coming out from those seeds.

I do not know any true species collection larger than the one I keep but I continue to be allured by the Dyckia hybrids too.
Yes, The best way to keep any plant is out of any container. Dyckias are such a wonderful new breeze on the xeric world people use to open their mouths when seeing a big deep red,or a blue or a silver imponent Dyckia. All the rest turn into a kind of mongery thing.

Dyckias are seem in every color possible and all the hues in between. They came in every size from minute to gigantic plants and better of all they are not bye-bye plants. They bloom and bloom and bloom without ever dying of blooming and theirfloweres can be spectacular and even so they do not think it is worth to die for. A xeric garden of Dyckias is a constant celebration of live and joy. You mau keep then in all sort of places and areas but any Dyckia plance must be sunny to the extreme. They survive to weel below freezing but just survive. They luv the tropical way of living: free on the nude, watching the stars at night and relishing the sun at day time. See some small ones on their red side:

Aren´t alluring ?
They will never die from blooming!
They willnever bring flower to their own farewell.
Pardon me the others but this is fact!
They are not temporary plants nor bye-bye ones!
You can follow a plant during all your life no matter how long you live. We found plants here with more than 800 years and living!
...and better yet: they get better and better every year....age just adds to their beauty.
People are not used to them and the vast majority of us never saw a collection of this vibrant plants live.
In america you can find some people who sell them. They, the American guys have the most beautiful Dyckia hybrids in the planet today.
Visit my blog and you will get to know even more about this dazzling creatures.

[Paul S]

Thanks again.

I have had a quick look through your blog to find pictures of those species you mention. Very beautiful plants. I will have another look through when I have an hour or 3 to relax and enjoy the pictures!