Hello everyone
I have found this bulb with a weird growth out the side. I am currently lifting pot grown bulbs and have also noticed a number with beginnings of brown softness around the base as well but this one has me perplexed.
Can anyone identify what this is and how it has come about please? Is there a possibility that something nasty which is causing this growth and the softness at base of some bulbs has arrived via the potting mix??
We hot water treat and post lift dip to prevent basal rot.
Many thanks Noeline McLaren Balclutha New Zealand
Dear Noeline The beautiful sick bulb you show us has what we call “Vethuidigheid”. Freely translated in English it would be something like “greasy skin desease”. It is coursed by a Fusarium fungus but this Fuasrium is from an other tribe than the Fusarium that courses basal rot. Very often this Fusarium gets help from another fungus called Stagonospora, and sometime Stagonospora does it all by its self. Sometimes when the temperature is high together with a lot of humidity this illness appears It hardly infects other bulbs during the storage period. If you dry the bulbs, peal of the sick skin and replant them bulbs often grow over it and be healthy again next year I always throw them away. Good Luck Carlos
Dear Noeline,
I cannot tell from the photo, but I found a group of bulbs intended to go to a friend last season(the box did not get taken to the post with the others- was hidden under the pots I planted the last bulbs into) and two of them had strange growths in a similar place- they were obvious regeneration- forming new bulbs adjacent to the failed bulb(whichwith no wated failed to bloom) I planted those which were sound(several were dry husks) and doubt that “La Paloma” will bloom there for me in the spring!(unfortunately out of row sequence but I have it labelled… Hurrah!)
John Beck
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Ah ha! That makes sense. I had noticed staganospora in the latter stages of the growing season and it was evident at the necks on some bulbs on lifting. The translation is very apt!! Has this also been the cause of the growth on the side of the bulb? I wondered if perhaps that bulb had been mechanically damaged at lifting time the previous year.
I have a rather ruthless policy on lifting of ‘if in doubt, chuck it out’ but it is reassuring to know that the bulbs of varieties that are newer to my collection and with only 1 or 2 bulbs can be saved. They are kept separate from the ‘healthy’ bulbs and will be pot grown and isolated to give them the opportunity to prove themselves before and if they go back to the collection. And I shall get my act together and get on top of staganospera etc next season.
Many thanks Noeline McL NZ
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