Sinningia gerdtiana

1. Pictures of whole plant
2. Blooming season
3. Fruit
4. Comparison to S. schiffneri
5. Hybridization
6. Feature table

This species is named after Gerdt Hatschbach, who led Alain Chautems back to the original collection site after an absence of 25 years, putting my 25-minute memory to shame.  Seed was distributed under inaccurate spellings of the given name.

Mauro Peixoto distributed seeds of this species at the 2002 AGGS convention in New Jersey.  Grateful gesneriad growers snapped up the seeds, sowed them, and about a year later started complaining.  "When is this thing ever going to bloom???"

Patience

Sinningia gerdtiana requires patience.  I sowed the seeds in July 2002.  Looked for flowers in 2003: nada.  Looked for flowers in 2004: zip.

Or so I thought.

In October 2004, Susan Grose, then president of the AGGS (later to become the Gesneriad Society), and her husband George stopped by for a visit.  I showed her my plants, and happened to complain about this big weedy plant over here which never bloomed.

"Really?" she said. "What's this?"

So she saw my first S. gerdtiana flower before I did.

In 2004, that large plant in a 12-inch [30-cm] pot had four flowers.  In 2005, however, it had a couple dozen flowers.  Moreover, three smaller plants in smaller pots have also bloomed.  So the determining factor appears to be age, not size.

Pictures of the whole plant

This is a section of the plant (photo taken 17 October 2006), showing one of the most floriferous sections.

This photograph, taken the same day, shows most of the plant, which was about 100 cm [40 inches] across.

Blooming Season

This species flowers in late summer or autumn.  The exact blooming season appears to depend on location or latitude.

For me, at latitude about 37.5 degrees north, it flowers (outdoors) in October (and was blooming in December 2010).  For Alain Chautems in Geneva, at latitude about 46 degrees north, it flowers in August.  In the initial publication of this species (see below), it is stated that judging by "the only two known collections, flowers are produced around February-March" (August-September in the northern hemisphere).  Whatever triggers flowering, it probably isn't day length (August is before the autumnal equinox, October is after it, no matter where you are in the northern hemisphere).

Fruit

This photo, courtesy of Alain Chautems, shows the unusual fruit of this species.

The capsules of most sinningias dehisce like a pair of hands clapping, splitting top and bottom and spreading apart sideways.  The capsule of Sinningia gerdtiana, however, splits left and right and opens like a duck's bill.

Botany geek moment here:

• The gesneriad ovary (and therefore, the gesneriad fruit) is made up of two subunits, called carpels.
• These carpels are "top" and "bottom", so that the two sections of the ripe fruit in the above picture correspond to the two carpels.
• Normal gesneriad capsules (including sinningia capsules) split into right and left halves, in effect cutting each carpel in two. This method of opening is called loculicidal. 
• The gerdtiana method is called septicidal, and is much more common outside the gesneriad family, because the break is along the seam which formed the junction between the two carpels.

Comparison to S. schiffneri

Here is a comparison between S. gerdtiana and its closest (but not very close) relative, Sinningia schiffneri.

Hybridization

By now, some crosses have been made with this species.  This picture is from Brad Walker, of his plant of Paliavana prasinata x S. gerdtiana.  The cross was done by Mauro Peixoto.  Brad has named his plant xSinvana 'Charity and Hope'.

Flower

The corolla has gerdtiana coloring and shape.  At least in the picture, there is no hint of the prasinata waxiness and speckling.

On the other hand, the calyx, with its lobes joined far out toward the tips, almost into a pentagon, is more reminiscent of the paliavana parent.  As can be seen in the pictures above, the gerdtiana calyx lobes are separated for most of their length.

Habit

S. gerdtiana branches freely and exuberantly, but this hybrid has the single stem characteristic of paliavanas.  The leaves are much closer in coloring and shape to the prasinata parent.

Brad says that "it is very easy to grow if you have the room."

He has also crossed S. gerdtiana with S. eumorpha and a eumorpha hybrid of his.