Here's my first complex of the season. This has been a rough beginning of the blooming year - a cool summer followed by heat to push along buds, then excessive heat to blast them. I've already lost a number of buds, and some buds are looking like they'll come out crippled like this one. This is Frostlight 'Julio Franchini' AM/AOS. Frostlight is a cross of two noted breeders - Gigi and Stoke Poges - registered by John Hanes in 1975. In my opinion Stoke Poges is very Hellas-like as a breeder, and tends to operate as a rather black slate upon which to spill the colors of the other parent. Maybe it adds a touch of amber - I just got a Stoke Poges, but I've never flowered it. I'm hoping to remake Hanes Green Gem (x Jolly Green Gem), but we'll see. Gigi is very dominant for color, and it's colored very similarly to this one. I have both 'Malibu' and 'Bonsall' in bud now so I'll show those to you when they open (provided they don't blast). Gigi is the parent of some 100 hybrids, many of which are awarded and include Gigilight, Via Luna Este, Sioux, Sauk, Venture, Vantage, Muir Woods, My Gigi, and a host of others.
I guess the point of this posting is to lament the decline of the complex paph in the US in the mid to late 1980s. This era saw the shuttering of complex breeding programs like McClellans and Gallup and Stribling and the shunting of many of our breeding stock to Japan. Despite being a product of great parents, Frostlight has been used in a grand total of three complex hybrids (and a ridiculous cross with primulinum). It seems that people just stopped making complex crosses just after Frostlights were awarded (in the early to mid 1980s) and these lines were not picked back up until the turn of the century or later. Not even the obvious crosses have been made with Frostlight - no crosses with Winston Churchill or Hellas or even a big green. I think it has attractive color - I'd like to see it crossed with some of the things Gigi was crossed with.
In any event I have a bunch of Frostlight clones and I'll post them as they flower - they're pretty and they grow well...nice traits I think. This clone 'Julio Franchini' was awarded in 1984 to my now-retired AOS judging mentor Fred Jernigan. Thanks Fred!
I guess the point of this posting is to lament the decline of the complex paph in the US in the mid to late 1980s. This era saw the shuttering of complex breeding programs like McClellans and Gallup and Stribling and the shunting of many of our breeding stock to Japan. Despite being a product of great parents, Frostlight has been used in a grand total of three complex hybrids (and a ridiculous cross with primulinum). It seems that people just stopped making complex crosses just after Frostlights were awarded (in the early to mid 1980s) and these lines were not picked back up until the turn of the century or later. Not even the obvious crosses have been made with Frostlight - no crosses with Winston Churchill or Hellas or even a big green. I think it has attractive color - I'd like to see it crossed with some of the things Gigi was crossed with.
In any event I have a bunch of Frostlight clones and I'll post them as they flower - they're pretty and they grow well...nice traits I think. This clone 'Julio Franchini' was awarded in 1984 to my now-retired AOS judging mentor Fred Jernigan. Thanks Fred!
