A marketing ploy has shown up on show benches here in Oregon for the last three years which carry printed nursery labels of : “White Tete a Tete”. I’m using quote marks as I can’t bring myself to use the legitimate single marks in hopes of giving you all an idea of my dismay and contempt.
Turns out that my recently passed friend, Bill Pannill, and his splendid cultivar ‘Toto’ is being sold to nurseries as “White Tete a Tete”. The grower sheets for these recommend applying any of a number of Plant Growth Regulators (tradenames like Citadel, Cycocel, B-Nine, Piccolo, Bonzi, Paczol, Concise, etc. etc.) to the potted bulbs to shorten the stems and leaves. This causes the potted plant to sort of look a little bit like ‘Tete a Tete’ but about 20% larger, taller and still expressing the form of ‘Toto’.
Of course the following season the bulbs revert to the height and size of ‘Toto’ unless drenched with one of the above PGR’s.
Remember those blue orchids all the grocery stores were selling a couple of years ago?