Tillandsia Tooshi
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Tillandsia Tooshi
schiedeana x (schiedeana x juncea) Rolly Reilly, Brisbane.
From Detective Derek schiedeana article DD0912 ....
"Its parents are said to be schiedeana x (schiedeana x juncea) in other words two schiedeana - Cough Cough – to one juncea. Even so the plant has more erect stiffer leaves than the quickly spreading horizontal leaves of what I think are ‘true’ T. schiedeana. Any doubts you may have are dispelled when you see the bicoloured petals! The parent (schiedeana x juncea) must have also been around but was never registered and could well have links with Maurice’s ‘Scurfy’. We are also talking about seed batches not offsets so you would expect variability.
| Rob Bower 09/20 as Tooshi |
Rob Bower 09/20 as juncea x schiedeana |
Rob Bower ... "Two pics of Tooshi (from JO - parents being juncea x schiedeana) and also two of 'juncea x schiedeana' which has on its label that its natural hybrid. They are very similar but the flower spike of the 'natural hybrid' is not smooth like Tooshi. I am wondering if anyone knows about the natural hybrid - or is it just a remake of Tooshi?"
Chris Larson ... "Sort of right John. T. Tooshi is T. schiedeana x (T. schiedeana X juncifolia) by Rolly Reilly - so a man-made hybrid. I always thought it strange that the three way cross was registered with a cv name, but not the 2 way - possibly as this is a Nat Hyb"
Ed. ... "Bird Rock Tropicals is selling "juncea x schiedeana as a natural hybrid, TX057 from Costa Rica", this has now been captured in the BCR as T. 'Little Star'. Rolly Reilly's cross (Tooshi) was probably the natural hybrid crossed back onto schiedeana again. See Detective Derek schiedeana article DD0912"
Tillandsia ‘Tooshi’ by Derek Butcher 11/2009.
This all started with Chris Larson bringing me a plant, coming into flower, when he was in Adelaide for our November Bromeliad sale. His interest had been sparked by one of the members trying to get some identification of a Tillandsia with a bi-coloured flower (yellow at the top and reddish below). Our experience over years with plants with this sort of petal colour has convinced us that T. schiedeana is a very promiscuous distributor of pollen! AND yet the only natural hybrid to be named is T. Xrectifolia (ionantha x schiedeana).
In our wanderings around the garden we felt his plant had to be very close to a plant I had had for many years called T. schiedeana 'Scurfy' from Maurice Kellett. It seems this has bi-coloured flowers too – see photo. Years ago this did not worry me because Sue Gardner considered that T. schiedeana var. glabrior described as having red flowers could have bicoloured petals. var. glabrior is now treated as a species and the cat is amongst the pigeons. Taxonomists will not accept natural hybrids between varieties within a species but will between species! Could Sue Gardner's plants have been hybrids?!
Back to the home front where we will have a look at 'Tooshi'. This came into being in the early 1990's with Rolly Reilly in Qld. Its parents are said to be schiedeana x (schiedeana x juncea) in other words two schiedeana - Cough Cough – to one juncea. Even so the plant has more erect stiffer leaves than the quickly spreading horizontal trend of what I think are 'true' T. schiedeana which agree with the herbarium specimens I have seen. Any doubts you may have are dispelled when you see the bicoloured petals! The parent (schiedeana x juncea) must have also been around but was never registered and could well have links with Maurice's 'Scurfy' because he saw differences. We are also talking about seed batches not offsets so you would expect variability.
I have a feeling that the 'true' T. schiedeana is rare in Australia having been taken over by the vigour of a hybrid with bicoloured flowers. Would you please do some checking and proper looking so we can get a bit of concensus?
By the way I have included Eric Gouda in this because I have a photo taken by him of a T. schiedeana with – guess what- bicoloured petals!
Updated 04/11/23
