B. (schmidtiana x semperflorens var.)

Culture

Original Botanical Description or Link to

Begonia Schmidtiana Revue horticole. Paris: Librairie agricole de la maison rustique 1829-1974. Anne 1902: Page: 387-8 http://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/196514 (translated with Google Translate) The Begonias are slowly but surely one of the first places in the decoration of the gardens, wherever the soil is not so limestone as to render their cultivation difficult. This evolution is due to the richness of the species genus and the many hybrids created in recent years. Among the species, two of them, crossed between them, have contributed to endow the horticulture with a large quantity of robust and floriferous forms, which are called to completely supplant the Begonia semperflorens. These are B. semperflorens itself and B. Schmidtiana, better known as B. Schmidtii. One of the earliest hybrids of this origin is the B. versaillensis on Schmidtiana rosea obtained by chance at the Ecole Nationale d'Horticulture in 1890. It is a plant of 1/4 meter high, with greyish branches, reddish, slightly inflechis, shiny leaves, glabrous, green bronze, has more inflorescences less drooping, counting from nine to eleven medium-sized flowers, light pink. They already possessed B. bruanti, Bruant, with white flowers; the obelisk hybrid, Lemoine, was found with white feathers, tinged with rose on the edges. All these hybrids were sterile. Fertile plants were obtained very early, which at first resembled much more varieties of B. Schmidtiana than hybrids of this species. It is these varieties, probably, and especially those known under the names of 'Gerbe Fleurie', Lemoine, 'Fleur de Neige'. Lemoine, which, after having been crossed by the series of B. semperflorens, produces the first two true and fertile hybrids of B. Schmidtiana. These plants, B. gracilis rosea, which appeared in 1898, and B. gracilis alba, in 1899, were put into commerce by the Vilmorin house; they had been obtained by Mr. C. Walker, Chief Gardener of the Beauregard Estate. Case B. gracilis, rose and white, had preserved a little of the pillosus of B. Schmidtiana and its abundant fruiting; this last character was also very detrimental to their flowering, which was always slowly decreasing as soon as the first capsules appeared. But, little by little, by selection, M. Walker has succeeded in producing B. gracilis of a more moderate fruiting and of a more sustained flowering. I have entered into my own breeding, with B. semperflorens on the one hand, then B. 'Gerbe Fleurie', 'Fleur de Neige' and some other hybrids more or less fertile on the other hand, a series of crosses and observations which have given me curious discoveries. First of all, among the descendants of these crosses, I naturally distinguished individuals of very different flourishes and fertility. Thus, in some hybrids, the inflorescence showed up to 30 flowers and flower buds, whereas it was only 5 to 7 in B. semperflorens and not more than 11-13 in B. Schmidtiana. The same difference in fertility: in this respect, some plants carried up to 6 or 7 fertile capsules, others 2, and others not at all. Finally, in a small number of hybrids, there were no female flowers. With the aid of a continuous selection, I was able to fix three types of these Begonias; they reproduce identically by seed, but their seeding is rather feeble, owing to the special choice of the parent plants; one is purple-leafed, has red flowers; the other has green leaves bronze, pink flowers; the third, green foliage, possesses white flowers. These three plants are grown in place of the three varieties of B. semperflorens (atropurpurea, rosea, alba). To give an idea of their superiority, I compare an inflorescence of B. semperflorens and an inflorescence of one of the hybrids. Finally, in 1899, following the crossing of B. Schmidtiana 'Flower of Niege' by B. semperflorens 'alba', I noticed the production of a whole line of hybrids exactly similar, with white flowers, very abundant. These hybrids, all sterile, resembled each other at such a point, as size, harbor, and floribundity, that they might have been taken for plants derived from cuttings borrowed from the same individual. The only B. 'Fleur de Neige' I had perished in 1900, I could not repeat this experience, but I propose to repeat it this year; it may confirm the possibility of creating an unlimited number of sterile hybrids, all similar, by the sole choice of the generators. This is important because sterile hybrids do not exhaust themselves and can provide a more abundant and prolonged flowering. In summary, if the progress made is already enormous, we believe that the improvement of hybrids from B. Schmidtiana is not yet complete. It is possible, by selection, by backcrossing or outcrossing, or by self-fertilization, to obtain individuals still more floriferous, with larger flowers, and a thicker habit. Regarding floribundity, which is the most essential characteristic, to increase it both in appearance and in reality, we must try to modify the inflorescence in motion, to try to make it less tight and less fertile. To do this, let us eliminate any individual presenting a compact inflorescence. In the case of breeding, we choose the very branching Begonias, in which the inflorescence, of medium fertility only, presents itself with numerous and especially long ramifications, divergent, as in order that their flowers provide a maximum of space and produce a maximum effect. - GEORGES BELLAIR