I've never heard of a cruenta 'Bronze', Hayes. I'm wondering if that could be 'French's Cruenta', which is actually (supposedly) a form of N. johannis. Do you have a photo?

Depending on how up-to-date your source is, "cruenta Rubra" could either refer to the solid red form of N. cruenta or to N. johannis 'Fairchild' or a similar cv. There has been a lot of name confusion between those two species, and older material under that name is often johannis.

The link below shows the true N. cruenta (both green and red forms) at the top, and 'French's Cruenta' at the bottom. BTW, I tried to convince Uncle Derek to call it 'French Form' instead. That way it could be appended to whatever the current species designation is, and help eliminate some of the confusion, but he seemed to think the name was too well established to change. *sigh*

You can use the same search engine to look up Fairchild too. All three are quite different.

Here is a link that might be useful: FCBS search results: cruenta

I have all 3 colors, although I've been trying to get rid of the bronze one. All of these are original plants that I was given so none were necessarily grown to look their best (free plants are free for a reason no?).

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For some strange reason, I crossed the green with the red and now have a few seedlings. I may grow one or two out to see if I get bronze.

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Ha ha, too bad you aren't closer, I wouldn't mind taking scraps like that bronze if you were trying to get rid of it! I love how they splay open like that when they bloom. Nice looking plants.
-andy

here is the requested pic of my small cruenta bronze. its been grown in alot of shade, so its not really coloring up yet.

Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:497909}}

Hi Guys

I did some homework for Derek back in February '09' re: Neo. cruenta rubra/red form/Neo. Monstrum of which he forwarded to me a copy of an article of interest.
Uncle Derek Says: Neo. hatschbachii really Monstrosus.

Bromadams your third photo looks like Neo. Monstrosus.

Pinkbroms

Well, that's interesting, Nick. I've never seen that first bronze-colored one, and it does look like a cruenta (not johannis).

LOL, I tried crossing the red and green cruentas too, about 30 years ago when I was first tinkering with that sort of thing. Back then everyone was calling the red one hatschbachii, so I thought they were two different species, but nope. Results were pretty much like a darker green cruenta with a slightly redder tinge, especially on the tips. Definitely nothing to write home about, and no bronze.

What is going on in that last picture? Did you cut the whole inflorescence out to harvest the seed???

I like to grab the inflorescence and just spin it out. 1 to 2 turns usually does it. Hold the inflorescence and spin the plant if you can. On some of the tight ones like Donna I've had to grab/jab the inflorescence with some long pliers to spin it out as I couldn't get my fingers in there.

I like headless neos. They don't have that old mother look and smell much better. And then a few fert pellets in the middle seems to help get those last few pups started.

I have pulled the inflorescence and then dug out the seed pods, but usually I don't. The most recent seeds I've collected were from a Nid 'Leprosa' and I didn't spin that one out. The nids don't look so good headless.