Joe,

A couple of years ago I got a heavily veined noid orange as a mislabel, never did find out what it was. Your Red Lion kind of looks like my noid orange with the veining showing at the borders but, if yours is truly red than...who knows.

Your papilio looks great! Just keep one thing in mind, that next year or whenever it decides to bloom again the flower will be much prettier and much curvier..mine all got much better with age...and yes, some of them can be quite green, nice huh?

Donna

Hey Donna,

Yeah, It's very red. I double-checked and didn't see any orange. Forced flash on it:
{{gwi:442342}}

Gets pretty dark red down into the throat as well. I don't know why it's tinged white like that. I keep thinking the blooms might be 'old' because both bulbs sure spent an entire month getting their buds up before they flowered.

I love my Papilio. I'm glad that turned out to be correct! :) I've been thinking of what I'll do with it come spring. I keep reading that pots are better in encouraging the bulbs to bloom. I might get a good-sized pot to put it in and let it grow in there for a bit.

I don't have much use for the red flower seeing as how I have so many red ones. :O So far my plan for Papilio is to self each one and then maybe use the Pap pollen on the red blooms - and then hopefully be able to successfully store the rest of the Pap pollen for spring for the other flowers.

Joe,

I've read that in order to successfully self a papilio you need to have two different clones, not just two different papilio bulbs but different clones. I'm sure someone out there will have a more definitive answer as to sucessfully selfing a papilio...having a bulb with roots would help too. I was lucky with my 1st papilio bulb, it came rooted in a pot with a bud!!

My suggestion to you would be to put Chico on one and or a cybister of some type (preferably one with some papilio in it's background)..or, Exotic Star..on the other. I'd hate to see you end up with nothing on your papilio. Grafitti should work too. Of course you can try papilio pollen on anything and everything, you never know what might take and all you need is a few good seeds..from any particular cross.
Best of luck with whatever you do and let us know what you decide to do. I have a papilio that will be blooming in about 10 days to 2 weeks. I'll have some decisions to make too but I'm definitly thinking of putting Chico on one..(just look at all the gorgeous flowers from that cross by Hans-Werner) I may put Tango (a pink cybister) on the other...time to think about it though.

Donna

Yeah, I read about Pap disliking its own pollen, too. All I have right now is just these two blooming and I'm not sure I want to have Red x Pap. I have so many reds, and I don't see Red x Pap doing anything interesting.

I could always try microwaving the red pollen, mix some pap pollen in, and see if the pap will take its own pollen that way. I've read that as a suggestion but I haven't found anyone that says the method works. I don't have anything to lose by trying, at least.

And I guess, further thinking, I also have nothing to lose by using pap pollen on the red either. Might as well. That way there'll be the possibility of seeds if I'm interested in trying something down the road.

I like the veining and dark throat in that red flower... it adds some interest. I'm generally not a fan of the reds... but I like this one!

Your papilio looks great! Just keep one thing in mind, that next year or whenever it decides to bloom again ...Well said Donna
I keep wondering what influences it to decide.