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Post by Tucson Grower on Apr 1, 2023 12:04:05 GMT -6
I'm trying a couple of these, for the first time. One thing I noticed right away about them, is, I planted three different 6-pacs, at various times, through the winter. On the heat mat, at 80F, I got nothing. Once I gave up on them and decided to try again, I moved them off the heat, when they almost immediately germinated. What's up with that? Maybe they have cold tolerance? Or just don't like too much heat.
I like how the fruits have a dark purple/red cast. I'm growing a few plants of several different varieties, looking to gauge cold tolerance, here in my USDA zone 9 limits. |
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Post by hedgeapple on Apr 1, 2023 18:59:50 GMT -6
You are dealing with Abelmoschus caillei there. Very different plant. Takes longer to establish than A. esculentus.
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Post by Tucson Grower on Apr 1, 2023 19:42:21 GMT -6
I knew it were a different okra species, just know very little bout it - I'm gonna need to see if I can find any informational material I can read up on it at. Part of the reason it will be good for me to try growing it - so I can become more familiar with different branches of the okra family tree.
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Post by Tucson Grower on Apr 7, 2023 10:33:26 GMT -6
I just got a surprise. Initially Baker Creek had this okra variety listed as Abelmoschus caillei, but now they've changed their description, calling it Abelmoschus esculentus - I wonder what's going on with that?
Edit: apparently Baker Creek weren't identifying this as A. caillei, rather - Truelove Seeds.
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Post by hedgeapple on Apr 7, 2023 12:44:40 GMT -6
Sometimes they can be hard to distinguish, being that caillei was a hybrid of esculentus to begin with. I’ve looked at a few pictures of Nkruma Tenten online and I think Baker Creek is wrong. It may be that NT is caillei that was crossed back to esculentus, but it does not look like just common okra to me.
It is from West Africa, grows super tall (and allegedly like a tree), grows slowly, has large flowers and a thick calyx - that all says caillei to me.
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Post by Tucson Grower on Apr 7, 2023 13:23:32 GMT -6
I have a German acquaintance, whom is a botanical and horticultural nomenclature specialist. I'm sure he would agree with us; especially since the initial hybrid of A. esculentus x A. manihot = A. caillei was officially elevated to species status, then, no matter the backcrossing involved, as long as the three species are the only ones involved in the crosses, it will always be A. caillei, no matter what % of each is in the final offspring. I've worked with my taxonomist friend on a similar case with another plant genus. He's also a stickler for the italics, too. Though he also prefers the annotation of the author - I often leave it out, he usually lets me get away with that.
I believe that A. caillei was created to give yellow mosaic virus resistance to okra. Resistance, bred in, from A. manihot. So, if this plant has this virus resistance, that proves its provenance as A. caillei.
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Post by Tucson Grower on Apr 7, 2023 14:15:07 GMT -6
I just discovered that it was Truelove Seeds that provided, what I believe to be the true identity of this variety. In my shopping excursions I mixed up a few of the associated details. As sometimes different seed companies can have varying descriptions of the same plant variety (case in point). This disparity between Baker Creek and Truelove Seeds, seems curious. I wonder what the story is about that.
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Post by Tucson Grower on May 20, 2023 1:50:04 GMT -6
Here is a pic showing a 15 gallon pot with 6 of these crowded into it. -->
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Post by Tucson Grower on May 22, 2023 8:10:13 GMT -6
I noticed that AfricanX and Nkruma Tenten look very similar.
Pic of AfricanX -->
Updated pics of AfricanX, then Nkruma Tenten taken Saturday, 3 June 2023 --> 
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