# Phrag. exstaminodium ('Gandalf' CHM/AOS x self)



## Drorchid (Mar 29, 2010)

A species you don't see too often. This seedling originated from Orchidbabies.





















Robert


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## Shiva (Mar 29, 2010)

Very nice, and the plant doesn't look as big as I thought.


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## KyushuCalanthe (Mar 29, 2010)

Eh! Of course the logical question is, where do those petals end?!


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## SlipperFan (Mar 29, 2010)

It looks like popowii ex-stam.


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## NYEric (Mar 29, 2010)

pm'ing


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## Rick (Mar 30, 2010)

Mine's in spike now too Robert. When did yours start? I think it's going a lot slower than typical long petaled phrags.


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## Rick (Mar 30, 2010)

SlipperFan said:


> It looks like popowii ex-stam.



I guess that's part of the debate.


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## Heather (Mar 30, 2010)

Nice!!


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## SlipperKing (Mar 30, 2010)

Great pouch coloring. I got one from Earl also but not anywhere close to blooming.


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## NYEric (Mar 30, 2010)

Err, is this extaminodum?


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## paphjoint (Mar 31, 2010)

Very nice !


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## Rick (Mar 31, 2010)

NYEric said:


> Err, is this extaminodum?



It breeds true from the parent.

There was a thread a ways back that discussed the sources and characteristics of "true" exstaminodium. Earl did chime in with source verification.


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## NYEric (Mar 31, 2010)

I need to find that thread because there is currently some confusion w/ type descriptions and plants sold as extaminodum! Thanx.


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## Drorchid (Mar 31, 2010)

NYEric said:


> I need to find that thread because there is currently some confusion w/ type descriptions and plants sold as extaminodum! Thanx.



Do you mean this thread?:
http://www.slippertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=12240

Robert


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## NYEric (Mar 31, 2010)

Yes that one, thanx. too bad the photos are gone from the taxonomy thread.


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## Phrag-Plus (Mar 31, 2010)

NYEric said:


> Yes that one, thanx. too bad the photos are gone from the taxonomy thread.



Hi Eric, I did put back my photos on the taxonomy thread...

For me Gandalf and Wotan are not the true specie, is it an hybrid or an exstamino popowii??? 

For me one thing is clear they doesn’t fit the reference description of the specie from Castano, Hagsater and Aguirre. 

I did even saw photos of Wotan with a very nice and well formed staminod... Showing than it is definitively not the true specie.

http://www.slippertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=10081&highlight=extaminodium


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## NYEric (Apr 1, 2010)

OK, then which or where is the "true" extaminodum!?


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## Rick (Apr 1, 2010)

I think we're getting into some pretty fine hair splitting again. Separating Gandalf from Roberts other exstam (because of the difference in petal stance), would be like calling Fabrice's new roth a hybrid or new species based on the same degree of difference from the type description of the dorsal sepal. For that matter, how many "species" of lowii and phillipinense would there be if they were differentiated by the same degree of petal stance we are scrutinizing these exstaminodium by.

lindenii is argueably just a mutant of the old wallisii, and every now and then I've heard one pops up with a pouch (or is it the occaisonal wallisii that comes out pouchless?). But I bet if you put ten in the same picture you'd see about as much variation in petal stance. So are the ones that end up with pouches new species, and the ones that are not a photocopy of the original type description hybrids?

Technically if you don't have an unbroken chain of documentation of the source of origin of the plant in question then you are SOL as being 99.99% sure in any case of a species plant.

However Gandalf is a non-staminode popowii like flower that breeds true, and is already entered into AOS awards.Taxonomy was "verified" by Koopowitz. So for practicality sake its considered an exstaminodium by the AOS. Which for many is not worth the paper its printed on either.


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## musiclovertony (Apr 1, 2010)

Very lovely!


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## Phrag-Plus (Apr 2, 2010)

Rick said:


> I think we're getting into some pretty fine hair splitting again. Separating Gandalf from Roberts other exstam (because of the difference in petal stance), would be like calling Fabrice's new roth a hybrid or new species based on the same degree of difference from the type description of the dorsal sepal. For that matter, how many "species" of lowii and phillipinense would there be if they were differentiated by the same degree of petal stance we are scrutinizing these exstaminodium by.
> 
> lindenii is argueably just a mutant of the old wallisii, and every now and then I've heard one pops up with a pouch (or is it the occaisonal wallisii that comes out pouchless?). But I bet if you put ten in the same picture you'd see about as much variation in petal stance. So are the ones that end up with pouches new species, and the ones that are not a photocopy of the original type description hybrids?
> 
> ...



Hi Rick,
I do understand and agreeing with you in some points, but for me there is much more than just a petal spread and missing staminode involve here. 

Yes it breed true, and now with those self (or F1 x self) we are going to have a wide range of variation between the two species involved there… For me the risk of loosing the genetic pool of this gorgeous specie is real and make me feel very sad. 

Yes, papers were printed and the AOS did recognise and awarded it… And yes unfortunately we will have to live with it now, but people are not allowed to know it, that way they can make their own research and opinion about this. 

Jean-Pierre


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## Rick (Apr 2, 2010)

According to Koopowitz, the missing staminode is a simple recessive trait, and hybridization with non exstaminodium species produces plants with normal staminodes. So I don't see any evidence of hybridization in these plants.

Since this species was a fairly recent discovery, it also seems like a fairly ambitious project for no value (pure research??) for someone to cross with popowii, and then self offspring until a new stable green house population of exstaminodium was developed. You would think that there would be a lot of left over hetero-popowii on the market if that were the case, but popowii is just about as hard to come across as exstaminodium.

Who knows, maybe the Gandalf line are escapees of the hybridization experiments that Koopowitz aluded too?:evil::evil:

I'm more inclined to think that even though this is a rare plant with very limited distribution that the subtle differences in flower we are seeing are normal variation for the population or cultural conditions. I guess it is a shame that the Chain of Custody from colection to this point apears to be broken so no one can prove that the plant is 100% exstam.


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## Rick (Apr 2, 2010)

Phrag-Plus said:


> Yes it breed true, and now with those self (or F1 x self) we are going to have a wide range of variation between the two species involved there… For me the risk of loosing the genetic pool of this gorgeous specie is real and make me feel very sad.



I would be sad (or deadly bored) if every flower from a species always looked identical. Just from growing the same plant for several years in a row, I get as much diversity in flower form as we've seen in Robert's two exstaminodiums.

How boring would this forum be if every species flower that individuals posted from their collections all looked identical? 

I'm not ready to decry loss of genetic pool until some real comprehensive field work is undertaken, and diversity from the type specimen is measured.


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## Phrag-Plus (Apr 3, 2010)

Rick said:


> According to Koopowitz, the missing staminode is a simple recessive trait, and hybridization with non exstaminodium species produces plants with normal staminodes. So I don't see any evidence of hybridization in these plants..


There is always two way to look at this…

The first one, by considering exstaminodium by only one trait the missing staminode. 

The second one, by looking at the entire flower structure, and for me there is much more than just subtle differences. It’s like the difference between boissierianum and longifolium for me. 

How can we said than it is a recessive trait before to do some hybridization with???
Is there anybody makes hybrids with it, I just saw one or two of them… 
And did they use the real or the weird one?

From a personal communication all the seedling of Mem. Julius Dixler (caudatum x exstaminodium) came out without staminode. Strange for a recessive trait isn’t!
I’ve made many primary hybrids with my plant, future will tell us, and this not just hypothetically but as a fact.





Rick said:


> Since this species was a fairly recent discovery, it also seems like a fairly ambitious project for no value (pure research??) for someone to cross with popowii, and then self offspring until a new stable green house population of exstaminodium was developed. You would think that there would be a lot of left over hetero-popowii on the market if that were the case, but popowii is just about as hard to come across as exstaminodium.



Popowii is much more easy to grow and keep in cultivation for me. From my hybridization I did found than lindenii and exstaminodium were much more difficult to kept alive after taking them out of flask. I’m wondering if it is because they were self-pollinated and lose their vigor with time ( I had the same problem with the longifolium alba?) 



Rick said:


> I'm more inclined to think that even though this is a rare plant with very limited distribution that the subtle differences in flower we are seeing are normal variation for the population or cultural conditions. I guess it is a shame that the Chain of Custody from colection to this point apears to be broken so no one can prove that the plant is 100% exstam.



I’m entirely agree with you, except on one point, the subtle difference…


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## Drorchid (Apr 5, 2010)

Rick,

Actually the characteristic of having "no staminode" is dominant and not recessive. I have heard that all seedlings of Phrag. Mem. Julius Dixler (caudatum x exstaminodium) lack their staminodes. We have some in-spike that will be blooming shortly, so I will post some pictures, but if you can't wait that long, here is a picture I found on the internet:

http://www.pbase.com/the_aos_cjc/image/115798414

Robert


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## Rick (Apr 5, 2010)

Drorchid said:


> Rick,
> 
> Actually the characteristic of having "no staminode" is dominant and not recessive. I have heard that all seedlings of Phrag. Mem. Julius Dixler (caudatum x exstaminodium) lack their staminodes. We have some in-spike that will be blooming shortly, so I will post some pictures, but if you can't wait that long, here is a picture I found on the internet:
> 
> ...



Some one better write Koopowitz a note!

Has anyone selfed Phrag. Mem. Julius Dixler?


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## Drorchid (Apr 6, 2010)

Rick said:


> Some one better write Koopowitz a note!
> 
> Has anyone selfed Phrag. Mem. Julius Dixler?



Not yet (that I know), but once ours bloom I will try selfing one.

Robert


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## Rick (Apr 6, 2010)

Drorchid said:


> Not yet (that I know), but once ours bloom I will try selfing one.
> 
> Robert



How often do you think this cross has been made Robert? Do you think this hybrid is now more common than the species in cultivation?

Is it possible that the particular caudatum used for this breeding was a recessive carrier for non-staminode. 


Compared to Paphs it seems that Phrags seem to be much more "plastic" about going into self fertilizing mode (lack of a staminode seems to facilitate this in exstaminodium). But given the relative lack of exploration in the rain forest I wonder if we will continue to find scattered populations of different phrag species that have gone into selfing mode.


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## Drorchid (Apr 7, 2010)

Rick said:


> How often do you think this cross has been made Robert? Do you think this hybrid is now more common than the species in cultivation?
> 
> Is it possible that the particular caudatum used for this breeding was a recessive carrier for non-staminode.
> 
> ...



I think that as exstaminodium is still so rare in cultivation (Just do a google search; how many pictures of exstaminodium can you find on the internet? and I personally have only seen exstaminodium twice), the chances that many people have made this cross are slim. We just recently got our plants from Dixler himself, who originally made the cross, and it is the first time I have seen them, so thus far I know it has only been made once.

To answer your other question, no I doubt that caudatum was a recessive carrier for the non-staminode trait. 

Going back to our 'Gandalf' x self; Here is my take on things: I have the same questions as Jean-Pierre (Phrag-Plus) has, regarding the authenticity of this plant (Is it a true exstaminodium or a hybrid between another long-petaled species). The reason I am saying this, is because like mentioned in a previous post, 'Gandalf' originated in a batch of seedlings that were originally labeled as "wallisii" but when they started blooming they noticed that they were not "wallisii" and because they were lacking staminodes they just assumed they were "exstaminodiums". But who knows for sure what they really are, as having "no staminode" is shown to be dominant, it could very well be a F1 hybrid of wallisii x exstaminodium.

Other clues that make me think that, is becasue when I compare our exstaminodium 'Extraordinary' with the ('Gandalf' x self) seedling the ("Gandalf' x self) seedling has a much smaller and skinnier pouch that looks more "wallisii" like; the pouch is lighter in color, The dorsal sepal is all green and lacks any dark pigments (as our exstamindoum 'Extraordinary' clone did have some brown pigments in the dorsal), the stance of the petals are different. In exstaminodium they are supposed to hang more in-front of the pouch at an angle. In this ('Gandalf' x self) clone they hang more behind the pouch. And the most important thing is that it lacks the little "dents" or "pock marks" on the pouch that differentiates the Central American species (both popowii and exstaminodium) from the South American species (both walllisii and caudatum have smooth pouches). 

Just for comparison:

pouch of exstaminodium 'Extraordinary':






pouch of exstaminodium ('Gandalf' x self):





pouch of popowii:





pouch of wallisii:





The problem is we never will know for sure (unless we do some DNA analysis) what the true origin is of the 'Gandalf' clone (and its siblings) is. At this point it is just speculation, but myself (based on observation) am leaning towards it being a hybrid.

I will post this is the Taxonomy Section as well, as this is starting to become more of a Taxonomy Debate...

Robert


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## Phrag-Plus (Apr 9, 2010)

Drorchid said:


> I think that as exstaminodium is still so rare in cultivation (Just do a google search; how many pictures of exstaminodium can you find on the internet? and I personally have only seen exstaminodium twice), the chances that many people have made this cross are slim. We just recently got our plants from Dixler himself, who originally made the cross, and it is the first time I have seen them, so thus far I know it has only been made once.
> 
> The problem is we never will know for sure (unless we do some DNA analysis) what the true origin is of the 'Gandalf' clone (and its siblings) is. At this point it is just speculation, but myself (based on observation) am leaning towards it being a hybrid.
> 
> ...



Very interesting observation, comparison and photos... I'm agreeing with you...


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