Indoor evergreen azaleas 2022

[Glaucus]

After raising about 3000 new azalea hybrids last year and about 70 cuttings, I upped the game for 2022 with this new grow box setup.

-Secret Jardin Hydro Shoot 150
-Grow 300 by Grow Light Sciences (2.4 umol/watt, 317 watt)
-Levoit LV600HH Humidifier
-Monkey fan

Right now, I am testing if I can keep the humidity at 70% or so, temperatures to be stable at 18-22C range, so I can harden off the plants that were under humidity domes.
Then my plan is to transplant a bunch into plug trays also.



Some cuttings of rare Japanese satsuki newly introduced to Europe & cuttings of some of my own 20-10 2012 seedlings.
One in particularly is taking off.



These are already quite sizable and ready to transplant to bigger pots once hardened off.




Original sowing tray with sphagnum.:


Once more I observe a trend that seedlings at the edges grow better than those in the center of the tray. This effect is even clearer in some other trays.
Maybe the edges try out earlier & better?

Some more smaller seedlings that are nicely spaced out, but that were sowed much later:





I think these two could use some more light. They were on the illumination edge of my other grow lights.

My biggest issue might be fungus gnats. In this grow box, I could pretty soon put a layer of sharp sand and/or vermiculite on top to cover up the organic material.
Maybe that with possibly bottom watering will alleviate.
I tried mosquito bits, nematodes, H2O2, hunting down larva by hand, capturing tons of the flies with sticky pads.
They don't go extinct.

I have some more space left in the box. This model can be put on the side. Normally, it is 2 meters tall with a 1.5x1.5 base. But I use a 2 by 1.5m floor area now. So that kind of works with the elongated nature of the Grow 300 LED.
The LED is really good, but maybe not ideal for a perfect cover in this box. I pulled up the LED panel as much as I can to raise it. But it still created a bit of a hotspot in the center.
I also don't use it on full power yet. I plan to put a chili and tomato plant in the hotspot, then crank it up so I get more light near the edges for my azaleas.

For good uniform spread, you need a bar light, not a quantum board type. And a 2.4 umol/watt efficiency bar light is always going to be a high end light, with the current technology.

Hopefully, by mid April, I will have this grow area filled with a ton of 15 cm tall seedlings. Then they go outdoors. I have a plot of land ready where I can plant them out. Others will go in plug trays or pots.
My idea is to keep the very bonsai oriented crosses in pots. While plating out the more landscape-oriented crosses.

 

[Deep Sea Diver]

Wow! You’ve been doing an awesome job.

I really like the new set up. It’s a huge set up from your previous set up.

Looking forward to seeing those big seedlings.

cheers
DSD sends

 

[Glaucus]

More humidity domes are not permanently removed. I did have to turn down the light intensity a bit more as I saw some strange coloration in some of the leaves (both reddish pigments in the newest shoot and some veininess in the more mature leaves, but nothing serious). Now, the Grow 300 is running roughly at half power.



Initially, azalea seedlings start out very green. But when they become more mature, many seedlings start to get some red pigments in their stems. These were sown in late October 2021.

Marashino x Hekisui

You can see all stems have a clear red pigment. This is also seen in mature azalea plants, but only if they have red or purple flowers.
Marashino is a sport of Maruska, a carmine red European/Hachmann kurume. Hekisui is a satsuki very pale base with a lot of variation.
Last year, Hekisui crossed with a white satsuki gave 100% green stems.

The theory is that this stem colour of seedlings already predicts the colour of the flowers they will have.
Reddish stem colour means that the seedling will have solid purple or red flowers.
The green seedlings will be either white, very pale in colour, or might be bicolour.

So the colour of Marashino is dominant. This is expected, because the entire Marashino/Maruska family tree is all solid reds. White flowers occur when a flower has no pigments at all. And for this, it needs to have two defective genes that are essential for pigment production. If an azalea gets one functional gene from one parent, the flower will be coloured (pale colours and bicolours are more complicated).
Every time I cross a solid red coloured kurume with a white or pale or multicoloured satsuki, the seedlings are all red-stemmed. And the theory says the seedlings should be all solid red, unless there is a recessive white gene in the kurume's ancestry somewhere. And this may be suggested by either a white flowering ancestor or offspring.


Milešovka x Hanatsuzuri

This is a cross between a very pale violet flower and a white flower that sports a lot of red.
But when I make a cross with a variegated satsuki, I make sure to take pollen from majority white flowers.

You can see that the stems in focus are clearly green. In fact, all stems of this cross (in this tray and others) are green.
The same is true for seedings from crosses between two pure white flowering azaleas. And from mature azaleas with white flowers. White flowering azaleas never have the reddish stems that brightly coloured azaleas have.

However, I also made a cross between Encore Sunburst and Hanatsuzuri.
Encore Sunburst has a bicolour flower, pink with a white margin (so called jewel border or fukurin type flower).
And these seedlings are a mix of stem colours:


The out-of-focus seedling in the center of the image is clearly entirely green. But there are two red stemmed seedlings to its right.
In the background, you can see a mix of both. In the top left, you can see some green ones. In the top right corner, you see a pair of seedlings, one green, one reddish.
This cross might give double/autumn blooming satsuki-type seedlings.

The hardening off process doesn't always go as planned. I have another tray of seedlings that was sown in late October. The seedlings are growing up against the top of the dome. So for the following tray, I removed the humidity dome last night for about 3 hours. And now many of the tips are a bit like this, burned:


So the cautionary tale here is that once a seedling grow up against a humidity dome, you'd like to remove the dome permanently. But for this, they need to be hardened off/adjust to lower humidity. This has to be done gently in a step-by-step manner. However, leaves that are up against the plastic are often in contact with liquid water droplets of condensation forming on the humidity dome. Therefore, these fragile leaves are basically not even trying to retain any water. So the transition from almost growing inside a liquid droplet to the dome being removed and it being in 30-50% humidity air while also under intense grow lights damaged the tips of these seedlings. The leaves touching the humidity domes are most likely to desiccate and lose turgor pressure in the hardening off process.
This tray, I should have hardened off earlier, and moved into the grow tent. This I have done now.
In the end, I think this is fine. Some tips might die off, and it will bud somewhere else. Or they will be able to recover the tissue damage and keep growing from the apex.

Also, notice again the red stems, 100% of them. This is a Čertoryje x Hanatsuzuri cross. So a very new Czech European kurume (adapted to harsh winters, little rain, a hardy variety with solid red flowers) and a newish very impressively flowering satsuki. But, I need a second generation to get Hanatsuzuri-type white base with red variegated flowers. I will judge the current seedlings on neatness of the flower, pleasantness of the flower colour shade, foliage attractiveness, general growth habit. Then cross again with something worthwhile to try to make a more hardy variation on Hanatsuzuri and similar satsuki.

 

[Glaucus]

'Autumn Sunburst' x 'Hanatsuzuri'



'Muneira' x 'Hekisui'

For these last, my aim is to get solid coloured satsuki type azaleas with quite small flowers and leaves, good to use for bonsai beginners.
The leaves on these seedlings are smaller and surprisingly pointy for a kurume x satsuki cross.
'Muneira' is a red kurume with quite small flowers. 'Hekisui' has leaves that are smaller and neater than 'Kozan'/'Nikko', but more variable colours.

 

[pweifan]

View attachment 419102
'Autumn Sunburst' x 'Hanatsuzuri'


View attachment 419103
'Muneira' x 'Hekisui'

For these last, my aim is to get solid coloured satsuki type azaleas with quite small flowers and leaves, good to use for bonsai beginners.
The leaves on these seedlings are smaller and surprisingly pointy for a kurume x satsuki cross.
'Muneira' is a red kurume with quite small flowers. 'Hekisui' has leaves that are smaller and neater than 'Kozan'/'Nikko', but more variable colours.

I'm very curious to know how these turn out You're describing some of my ideal flowers!

I have 5 Suisen x Kobai seedlings that survived me accidently spraying them with fungicide rather than water.

 

[Glaucus]

I'm very curious to know how these turn out You're describing some of my ideal flowers!

We will need some patience. Right now, I would be happy to start sharing cuttings from seedlings started in 2010-2014. I have my own cuttings now, and there is now time to share cuttings with others over the pond. But I am still evaluating if these are any improvement.

With the current Muneira x satsuki crosses, I expect 4cm flowers. There are some cool new Japanese varieties, including 'Hirogomo', 'Hi-no-Hikari', maybe a cross like mine will be similar. To me, Aozora/Hekisui(/Misora/Sakura) is very close to the perfect satsuki for a small bonsai. But in my climate, it just grows too slow.

No solid plans to breed for flowers below 4cm (for example by using Hanamaiko or Kakuo). But that might happen. For next year, I may try to cross more European kurume with Kozan.

So in 2032, I may be able to ship cuttings.

I have 5 Suisen x Kobai seedlings that survived me accidently spraying them with fungicide rather than water.

Would be great if you can get a seedling with thick petals in the Kobai-style rounded style. I think I mentioned this before, but strangely I don't think the Japanese registered any Suisen x Kobai (or their sports) varieties. Good luck with them.

 

[Glaucus]

This cutting from my own seedling We01 is taking off inside my grow tent:


With violet flowers with white centers (when mature), this selection is most known for the very attractive foliage. Very evergreen in winter.
As well as this cutting is growing, it does have these orange tips:


Not sure what that is. The new growth looks fine. So it does not seem to be a deficiency.
I run the Grow 300 LED at maybe 40% now. Maybe it is still too bright? But none of the seedlings or other cutting show this.

Another of my own unnamed varieties is Ae22. This cutting grows very well. The leaves are very typical R.indicum. despite the R.nakaharae influence. So far, this cutting prefers the upright growth mode. But soon, it will decide to bud back just above the soil with about 10-15 buds, I predict. Maybe this one is going so nice and straight into whip-form, I may decide to prevent this. Eventually, it will want to adopt a creeping habit.



Some of these may be for sale at some point.

I will evaluate again the mother plants this spring. But I lean towards naming both We01 and Ae22. Even though they may not be completely special and superior forms, they seem to be my best two selections. Any other seedling will take at least 5 more years to get some basic evaluation going.

In fact, many of the larger seedlings are now taking off very rapidly. I have not really seen this type of growth before. They are really thriving inside the grow tent.
I actually plant to move these out, and put other ones in the tent, while I adapt them to being without their humidity domes.
Some I must really transplant to plug trays. Either 60 or 80 wells. I will have to count the seedlings and decide.
Some of them are growing so fast, they might overtake my seedlings from last year. So that some 2021 seedlings will flower before the 2020 ones, if this rate of growth keeps going.
Many seedlings over 10cm tall now, adding up to half a cm each week.

Interestingly, these seedlings had their tips dry out just a tiny bit last week:


But today, they made a full recovery and are taking off:



These 'Autumn Sunburst' x 'Hanatsuzuri' are getting huge fast (@KiwiPlantGuy):

Leaves over 3cm. I probably will put these in a 60 cell plug tray later today.


This is the only plant so far that I moved from outdoors to indoors, with the goal of letting it flower early.
After 2 weeks inside, last week there was the first sign of new buds emerging.
Now, it is slowly leafing out everywhere:



And my other non-tent grow area:


The last two weeks, I have been using fresh nematode eggs that were properly refrigerated. It seems to have given me an edge over the fungus gnats.
They are not all gone yet, but I hope this will eradicate them completely.

 

[Deep Sea Diver]

You’ve got things really moving along!

So the question arises if you are raising these solely for testing as garden plants, for bonsai stock, or both? The reason why I ask is that some of your stock is growing in such a way as to create small whips. Maybe a small group, space allowing?

I’ve noticed that red tips seem to come from a number of causes… especially on established growth. Too much sun, often on a weakened, or drier, or nutrient deficient plant, Cold temperatures also often cause the tips of azaleas to turn red. In your case probably not so likely…. Over fertilizing slightly will do the same… of course more fertilizer turns the tips burn and can kill the entire plant.

It’s funny how one plant out of fifty can be affected this way.

btw: Your ASO4 XO. Tallest at 7.5 cm today. I need to split up these bunches so they can run, yet am out of space for at least 30 days!


Again, great job!

cheers,
DSD sends

 

[Glaucus]

Last year at the end of summer, I went through my cuttings when they were outdoors, and wired up a bunch of them. These are intended to be some form of bonsai eventually. The others I just allow to grow as much as possible any way they are growing. I have too many azaleas, obviously. So no idea what to do with them.
I tried to sell some, but I didn't advertise them well enough so I still have all of them. I will figure out what to do with them eventually.

This year, I just have a few cuttings. The Seiten ones are intended to trade and to spread around this new variety. I have just a few Haru no Sono, which I intend to grow as bonsai. Then my own varieties. And then I have some random cuttings which I want to experiment on. The main experiment will be overwatering. What does it actually do to an azalea? Same with overfertilizing. What does the damage look like. I am supposed to be an azalea expert, but often I am not sure what problems a troubled azalea has. So I want to overwater like 3 cuttings, have 3 controls. And see what happens. Same with fertilizer.

I fertilize at a low rate. I saw that Pitoon wants to fertilize his seedlings already. That may be fine. But most of mine just now got some liquid fertilizer and a few osmocote pellets. My soil usually is also 1/3rd potting soil that contains fertilizer. But that is about it.

So with these cuttings, I will decide at a later stage what to do with them. I did wire the large We01, but only to make it lower because it was in a plastic box before and touching the lid. So I used wire to bend it so it would be lower. The Ae22 one that i pictured seems to be an ideal whip candidate, though. I have a few other cuttings that are way shorter. I just let those grow.

If I have cuttings and no idea what to do with them, I can always prune them back hard, see if I can get some movement in them somehow, and put them on some bonsai-like trajectory.
But for We01 and Ae22 cuttings, I want to establish a bunch so I can send them out to be evaluated by other azalea growers at some point.
Still, having 1 of each on some form of bonsai trajectory would be good.

For both We01 and Ae22, I can sent out cuttings to those interested late June this year. I can provide pictures of how they look.
If anyone is interested in growing these, I will be happy to send out unrooted cuttings.

 

[Glaucus]

Some more transplants from last week. I put them in this plug tray (40 cells, 52x26cm). Then I put them inside a transparent plastic box with the lid on for a week (near the LED lamp). They had very little transplanting stress.
Some of these are pretty sizable already.

This cross is 'Milešovka' x 'Hanatsuzuri'. This cross I made specifically to try to get a stronger blotch in the throat of the flower. Ideally, a orange/golden one, rather than the lime-green yellowish one.
All seedling stem shoots are fully green, so I expect white, buff, pastel, blotch effect flowers. Plant habit is not very satsuki-like so far. So these are likely going to be a bit similar to many Glenn Dale's that are partially satsuki, partially Southern Indica/Belgian Indica/R.mucronatum. If I get the flower effect I am aiming for, it will take at least one more cross to get a more compact pointly-leaved R.indicum-type azalea.

BTW, storm is currently going on now. Outdoors, a tray went flying but the seedlings are fine.
I also noticed some seedlings outside are waking up already. So since I am partially running out of space inside, I will probably move some plug trays with 100 cells and smaller seedlings outside in the next weeks. I will put them in the polytunnel, and maybe that will protect them from any frost we might still have. But so far, cloudy rainy mild weather predicted. Atlantic winds, so no sunny clear spring days with nights where it drops below 0C predicted. But we still have March and April to come.

The bigger ones I will keep indoors.

I will do a new round of transplanting. Up next are the pure satsuki crosses 'Suisen' x 'Hanatsuzuri' and 'Kisshoten' x 'Hanatsuzuri'

 

[Glaucus]

Two weeks ago, I moved some seedlings from last year inside the grow tent. See all this growth after just 2 weeks:


I also spotted this critter. I am not sure if there will be any aphids for her to eat.

 

[Deep Sea Diver]

Sheltering these youngsters really seems to have pushed their growth forward!

Cheers
DSD sends

 

[Glaucus]

Transplanting these large seedlings. Ideally, this should have been done earlier. Some of these seedlings are already bigger than my 2020 seedlings at the end of the year.






Cross is 'Marashino' x 'Hekisui'.

 

[Glaucus]

This tray very clearly shows how seedlings in the middle grow slower&less healthy than those near the edges.


Cross is 'Suisen' x 'Hanatsuzuri', so I expect large triploid flowers with thick petals and interesting patterns.

I am sure I sowed this tray in parallel with this other one, same seeds, same sphagnum, same time.
Somehow, this next tray is one of my worst:


I cannot explain why this happened. I suspect they were stressed out at the beginning. Maybe gnats, maybe fungus, maybe too wet with too little light?
And basically they don't really recover. I transplanted out from these trays as well, so there is a bunch more of these that have a good size.

In contrast, these seedlings are really large, dark green, growing well (also at the edge):


'Kangiten' x We01, which is my own cross between 'Wintergreen' and 'Hekisui'.
Even with the R.nakaharae genes diluted to 12.5%, some of these seedlings are still creepers.

Regarding odd growth, this is a very rare example of probably mutant growth:


That tiny elongated seedling with miniscule leaves barely looks like an azalea, but instead some form of thyme or a weed. In fact, I am not 100% sure it is not a weed.
Small leaves may be nice, but this is a severe growth disability.

A less debilitating variation and also more common is this one:

We01 x 'Hanatsuzuri'

The large seedling on the left is normal. But the seedling on the right hugging it, see those very small leaves stacked tightly on top. It is growing, but this is odd growth. Is this the same mutation as what 'Kazan' has?

Here some less extreme examples:

'Suisen' x 'Hanatsuzuri'

I saw this last year with 'Suisen' x 'Hekisui' as well. I do not think it is related to polyploidy. But I have not seen it at all when crossing a satsuki with a non-satsuki.
My guess is these are of no value. I may give the ones that grow this way in a very symmetrical leaf pattern and are very healthy a chance.

In other (bad) news, a slug, that hitch hiked indoors on my outdoor azaleas, ate through the stem of my Jay's Ghost Scorpion Peach chili pepper seedling.
I will have to try to sow some more.

 

[Deep Sea Diver]

Interesting…. The interior of all seven of my trays always dries out faster then the sides too. I sometimes use this information that when moving cuttings around in a tray for optimal growth.

….and…gosh I thought the Netherland slugs only drank double filtered Hertog Jan rather then eat lowly vegetation such as chili pepper seedlings!

cheers
DSD sends

 

[Glaucus]

It was still just a baby. No Hertog Jan for that one yet. But an odd a appetite to go for the superhot chili pepper among 2000 azaleas.

I am still not sure where it dries quickest. You say it dries faster in the center? Anyway, that dynamic will change when potted in a pot or plug tray. Them all sharing a large tray has a different dynamic in terms of drying. With the size that some of them have right now, they dry out quickly.

 

[Deep Sea Diver]

Presently, from observation of 7 trays using 5 heating mats, (2 double mat trays, 3 single mat trays), the center area dries out the fastest by far. The growth appears to be greater on the sides. I did just get a 5’ commercial heat mat, that could be tried out too, buts it’s got repotted bonsai on it presently…

There is another variable that likely acts in concert with the heat mats. Concentration of light, that likely affects the outcome. This by accelerating photosynthesis/transpiration, given that the trays mostly have single lights for each, although there are three with overlapping light patterns. Yet again, similar results appear with drying in the center region on all, even in the tallest whip tray… where all the tallest plants (up to 22 cm tall) are put together in a large done… see photo.



There is one tray with light only on one side that still has this pattern, only weaker. Not sure how this affects the situation.

Just observational. I should’ve tracked growth/position, but I moved plants around take advantage of the faster growth or more heat situation.

cheers
DSD sends

 

[Glaucus]

These 'Hekisui' x 'Kangiten' seedlings have pretty nice foliage.
It is not easy to get seeds from 'Hekisui'.

Thinking about seedlings with small pointly leaves like Hekisui itself, no fast-growing seedling has leaves like that. It is only those with really dwarf growth and tightly spaced small leaves like in post #14. Not sure what that means for those making crosses aiming for small leaves. I can't tell the difference between a growth defect, and just small leaves and proper but slow growth.




My large indoor grow area now looks like this:


It greened out a lot. Hard to keep up with repotting. Space is basically gone. But it was snowing outdoors this week, Still a frost risk outside. Need a few more weeks.
For some trays, I will need to select out 4-6 of the best, and throw away 20+ otherwise fine seedlings because space and also my time is running out.

 

[pweifan]

Just checking in... How's everything going?

 

[Glaucus]

They are outdoors now https://www.bonsainut.com/threads/glaucus-satsuki-azalea-farm.56775/

I did just start growing indoors once more, rooting cuttings:


I guess I will post everything in the other thread from now on. Makes more sense.
Not sure what exactly to post. New seeds will be harvested in 1.5 month or so. But that just repeats the same thing.
Otherwise, first flowers may be spring 2023.