Orange lip variegated flowers of Five Coloured Orchid Variegated Chinese Clivia

Below are photos of one of my most valuable breeding plants. The leaves have five colours - white, light grey, dark grey and two shades of green. Grey and white are very sought after colours on variegated clivia leaves and a combination of these colours are quite rare to find.  Grey are usually found on fukurin variegation. The colours of the flowers are white, light green, medium green, yellow and orange. The flowers develop as white, green or green variegated flowers. The inner center of the flowers is a combination of two colours, yellow and orange in this case. This is also a rare phenomenon and something I have seen only on some ghost flowers. As the flowers open, orange start to develop around the edge of the petals. As for the leaves of this highly sought after variegated clivia, each flower looks differently with different patterns developing on the petals. When the flowers open the green variegation is quite pronounced, but it fades into either white or green or vague variegation when the flower is ready to drop. The pollen grains are much larger than any type of clivia and it is extremely difficult to get seed from this clivia, although it is luckily not sterile. It is approximately 7 years old and has made no offsets. Some of its seedlings should flower within a year or two and it will be interesting to see whether they also have variegated picotee flowers. Unlike other clivia plants with variegated flowers, the flowers of this plant is large and fully developed. The picotee and variegation patterns are visible on both side of the petals as you can see from the last photos. It is said that plants with variegated flowers and break up of flower colours as the case with this plant is used to create new flower colours.

More photos of my variegated clivia flower

Below are more photos of my variegated clivia flower. All photos were taken in white light or outside light to reflect the true colours of the flowers. In some I have used a colour chart to compare the colours of the flowers.You will notice that in some of the photos the variegation has become a dark green. The reason for this is that I have placed the plant for a couple of days in full sun light to reflect the true colours of the flowers and its petals. In nature most clivia grow in shaded areas under trees or bushes and the flowers easily get damaged when exposed to direct sunlight, wind or rain. When exposed to direct sunlight many flowers become darker like the blushes and pinks which might be an indication that it is not the true colours if kept in a dark spot. The albino flowers stayed white while the green variegated flowers has become darker and some of the lighter parts of the variegation has become a darker green. Two flowers had a few orange petals and some had a few orange dots on the flower petals. The orange petals are a little bit bigger in size when compared to the albino and variegated petals.

The photos below show the second bloom of this specific plant with more variegated flowers than the first bloom and with an increase in flower count. The flower stem is also longer. This year I have repotted it and it will be difficult to predict an improvement on the bloom in the photos below.

I believe variegated flowers are quite common in plants, but it is somehow rarer in clivia. So far I have two plants out of a total of 2000 flowering size Chinese plants that produce variegated flowers. I have never noticed or seen variegated flowers on ordinary clivia miniata. From what I have read on the internet, plants with an unstable gene pool produce variegated flowers and breeding with them can poduce a variety of different flower colours. Whether it is true for clivia must still be seen. Luckily this plant produce useable pollen on all the different flowers, whether albino or variegated or mixed orange/variegated as well as seed. The first year I harvested one seed and this year six seeds were harvested and planted in a separate pot to observe their growth rate and the type of flowers they will produce. I will appreciate it if someone who has done breeding with variegated flowers or has any information about the cause of variegated flowers can forward or share it with me at heingrebe@ymail.com    

Variegated Flowers of my variegated Chinese Clivia

Below are photos of my variegated plant with variegated flowers. In 2008 I have seen photos of such a plant in a Clivia book in China. Since some photos in books are faked, I started to ask around if someone has seen similar flowers on a plant. A collector in Beijing responded positively and told me that he had a couple, but sold them as the flowers are not stable. He could not show me any photos of his plants or where I could look for similar plants. I forgot about them and when I returned to South Africa in November 2009 one of the plants I imported as a seedling a few years earlier had a variegated flower on it. Unfortunately the flower was damaged. The plant come from one of the top 5 growers in China in 2006 who lives in Changchun. It is a relatively small plant with thick narrowish leaves with good variegation on the leaves. When I returned in 2010 from China, it flowered a month after my arrival, again in November. This time with more flowers and one flower with three orange petals - one of them variegated. I took the plant outside the shadehouse to photograph it in natural light.

Note the white flowers on the white section of the flower stem and the variegated flowers on the variegated side. I decided to place the plant in a suuny spot inside my house where it will be exposed to full sunlight for at least 4 hours per day to see the real colours of the flowers as shady conditions usually lead to lighter coloured flowers. Unfortunately I forgot about the plant and remember about it only on the 3rd day - after the sun damaged the flowers a little bit. But at least the true flower colours has become visible. Note the orange rims on some of the flower petals and the darker green variegation that makes the variegation almost invisible.

At the same time another interesting Chinese plant was in flower that produce green tulip flowers every year.

The colour of the flowers changed somehow after a few days in the sun as I placed it with the plant with the variegated flowers in the house. The green of the flowers is still visible to a degree.

The green leaf plant with the green tulip flowers easily produce seed, but the variegated plant produced only one seed a year ago.This year I am hoping to harvest at least four seeds from it. I suspect that the variegated plant will produce a % of offspring with variegated flowers, but will have to wait a couple of years to see the results.