Hello Thierry,
It's great to hear that you've got seeds from odorata X sororia. I've tried twice but wasn't so successful. Now, I'll be more encouraged to try it again. Did you use odorata as the seed parent or the other way around?

Good luck with your seeds; I look forward to seeing the new violet hybrids.

Take care, Tom

Hi Tom :-)

Just do it ;-)
Don't stop: there's nothing to loose trying anyway. I did many crosses but a few have succeeded, in fact 3 of them lol (luck is certainely the best thing). Maybe the results won't be interesting at all.
What did you try exactly Tom ?

You're right, I used odorata as the seed parent: I guess I was more in confidence with odorata's fertility of the flowers, and it must have something to do with a proud point of view from a French guy ;-) Just kidding, I tried using sororia as the seed parent as well but it had been a failure, doesn't mean it's not possible to do it, why should it be ?

Next spring I will work hard on making a perfumed Freckles: that's really a dream I wish I could make become true.
Come on, don't be shy, let's speak about your different crosses :-)

Take care :-)
Thierry.

Thierry, are you sure the seeds you've obtained by cross-pollination are really hybrids ? It's possibly the result of a self-pollination. you will be sure of the result, when the plant will begin to grow, and if the new plant has both characteritics of odorata and sororia.

Denis

Hello Denis :-)

Self-pollination with odorata's chasmogamous blooms ?! Come on be serious for a while :-p Sure, you never can tell anyway...
Wait and see :-)

Salutations lyonnaises ;-)
Thierry.

Well done Thierry!

But, no, don't call the offspring Mrs Pinehurst.
First of all, you will have to see how many different-looking plants you get. You can give them numbers or informal names at that stage (numbers are much safer - much less likely to 'escape' into general usage). Then, when you know they are stable (they do not revert to something else), you should give them a new name, conforming to the ICNCP rules, please. If the plant(s) are good and distinct enough, you might want to consider applying for plant breeder's rights. But you can look that up elsewhere...

It would also be good if you could check that parent was really V. sororia - some albiflora's are actually V. cucullata. For instance, check the shape of the hairs (trichomes) on the lateral petals: club-shaped suggests V. cucullata, rod-shaped suggests V. sororia.

Keep us posted!
I'm sure you would, anyway :)

Thanks for your advices Mike :-)
Numbers seem to be a good issue: adopted !

About ICNCP rules ? Well...well...well...you wrote rules ?...well...well...well. Let's forget the meaning ;-p Anyway, I'm not in business but in fun and passion so don't care much :-)Laws are made to be diverted, it's their reason to exist, so I will with great pleasure ;-)

I'm afraid I didn't understand the difference between cucullata and sororia :-/ Could you explain it in a easier way please, just imagine I'm 5 years old ;-)
Club-shaped or rod-shaped ?? Trichomes, not better ??

I, keeping you posted ? lol ;-) That's a brand new one...a good bet I guess :-)

All the best
Thierry.

Hello Thierry,
I'm sure I'll be trying some more crosses. As a hybridizer, I'm incurable. If I'm remembering correctly, I've tried odorata and sororia, together, both ways. I know for sure, that in Spring of 2005, I used odorata pollen on Viola sororia 'Priceana'. I'm pretty sure that I did the reverse cross, the year before. But in any case, I'll keep trying.
And now that you've "jogged my memory", I think I may actually have seeds somewhere from one of those crosses. If so, they definitely need to be planted. I'll look today and let you know what I find.

Good luck with your crosses for that "perfumed Freckles".
I look forward to seeing it some day.
Tom

Tom, not planted yet !! Ain't U ashamed ?!! ;-)
I kept my seeds from my crosses all summer long like a treasure in my fridge lol
U're right, crosses are so fun, I do think all violets oficionado are making some :-) But such a tought work; many tries for how many interesting results ?
Priceana ? Just imagine it could be possible to turn tne white into another color keeping the blue eye ??!! It drives me crazy 8-)

Take care :-)
Thierry.

Hello again Thierry,
I must say that I feel a bit scatter-brained and absent-minded. It was a very busy year (house building took priority) and I didn't have a lot of brain/memory to devote to plants. I say this because... after discussing Viola crosses with you here, I checked to see exactly what crosses I'd done and what seeds I had packed away. I actually DID have some success with sororia and odorata, after all, TWICE!
So, here are the Viola crosses I have seeds from and the number and condition/appearance of those seeds:

From spring of 2004:

1) Viola sororia 'Priceana' X odorata ('Sulphurea' X 'Clive Groves') 14 seeds total / 6 seeds look healthy and well-formed

2) Viola sororia (white) X odorata ('Sulphurea' X 'Clive Groves') 26 seeds total / 4 seeds look healthy and well-formed

3) Viola sororia (white) X sororia (pale mauve/pink) 18 seeds, all healthy looking

4) Viola sororia (common purple) X striata ~30-40 seeds, all small but healthy looking

5) Viola sororia (common purple) X walteri ~30-40 seeds, all small but healthy looking

and from spring 2003:

6) Viola odorata 'Sulphurea' X odorata ('Sulphurea' X 'Clive Groves') ~70-80 seeds, all healthy looking

7) Viola sororia (common purple) X mandshurica 'Fuji Dawn' only 2 seeds left -- I had germinated some of these but couldn't keep them alive

So, now I need to get these all planted to see what will grow from them.
Check the link below for a hint of what can come from odorata 'Sulphurea' X 'Clive Groves'
Wish me luck, Tom

Here is a link that might be useful: Viola odorata 'Sulphurea' X 'Clive Groves' F2

Well, I got all planted but the sororia X mandshurica (2 seeds).
But now I've got a question...

I was thinking of putting the pots outside to stratify, but it's so cold outside -- the ground has been frozen all day.

So, for now, I've got them on my parents' partially heated sunporch. It's fairly cold out there right now, so I was wondering if it would be cold enough to stratify them there. I put a thermometer out there and it's reading 45 degrees F (6-7 degrees Celsius). It never gets below freezing. Does anyone know if this is cold enough?

Hi Tom,

I like mine to get a good hard frost, preferably for a few weeks in total. The temperature in my greenhouse gets down below zero Celsius no problem, given such frosts. However, the ones I do in the fridge largely seem to work, and that is set at 4 Celsius.
So - I confess I don't know the critical temperature, and it might well vary from species to species, but zero is a nice round number!

There is another question lurking here.
How cold-tolerant are seeds of species which (as plants) are not frost-hardy? Hmmm....

Thierry,

1. Viola sororia vs. cucullata:

Here's how Kim Blaxland described the differerences (taken from a posting 5 years ago).

'The word 'cucullata' means hooded, referring to the appearance of the flower. The flowers are usually a little bluer than V. sororia, and on the top four petals, the base is heavily marked with dark blue, which gives the hooded appearance. V. sororia is usually marked on the bottom three petals, but not with such a dark blue, and not such a concentrated mark. The flowers are held well above the leaves, on long peduncles. The bottom petal is equal in length, or shorter than, the length of the two lateral petals (V. sororia has a bottom or spurred petal longer than the laterals), and the hairs on the lateral petals are clavate (straight in V. sororia). Auricles of the sepals on the flowers are not elongated, but they are on the seed pods, as pointed out by Mike. Viola cucullata is usually growing in very wet places, V. sororia in drier places.'

Also: If you look at Rob's superb photo of V. sororia 'Immaculata', you can see the hairs on the lateral petals are like little cylinders - parallel-sided all the way along. The hairs in flowers of C. cucullata get fatter at the outer ends, looking like tiny clubs or perhaps ten-pin bowling pins stood upside down.

- - - - - - - - - -

2. Plant names:

No, I didn't write the ICNCP rules, but as a scientist, gardener, author and photographer, I understand why they are there. I try to stick to them, and encourage others to do so.

Unless people use the correct names (and I know it is difficult sometimes), all sorts of information gets associated with the wrong names, which helps nobody. It means when you look up a plant to find out how to grow it, for example, you might get completely wrong information - either because the plant you bought has the wrong name on the label or because the author of the information got it wrong.

I know, I know... If you're doing it just for your own fun, you think it won't make any difference. Many times that will be true. But it is funny how names can stick. And maybe your fun new hybrid is admired by friends, so you give them some of it; and through them it may find its way into nurseries. Naturally, it would tend to retain the name you gave it (though nurserymen are far from blameless when it comes to confusion of names). So then the public are buying your plant and its too late to change it, at least not without a lot of effort. And we know how much gardeners hate to have the names of their plants changed! (Aubretia to Aubrieta, Senecio to Brachyglottis, etc.)

Many different groups of garden plants have custodians for their names - registrars. These are the people you should speak with for advice on names - they will be able to tell you if your proposed name conforms to the rules, and also whether it has been used already! It can be very confusing when two different plants have the same name, obviously! But the world of plant names is far from perfect; Viola has at least one example of this. Viola 'Mars': one plant is a pansy, the other is a hybrid Japanese violet. Sigh!

So, who is the registrar for Viola?
Last I heard, it was Tom Silvers (PO Box 1405, Frederick, Maryland 21702, USA).
He used to be at registrar@americanvioletsociety.org, but that no longer works. So now I don't know :(

But if you want any names checked, let me know and I will do my best.

Now go back and have some more fun :)

Mike

Here is a link that might be useful: Link to Rob's photo is at the top of this thread

Hello Mike,
It's good to hear from you again.
And you've caught me, guilty as charged; I am the registrar.
That is, I agreed to try to fill those shoes, when Peter Robinson stepped out. I am still paying to keep a Post Office Box open, so the mailing address is still valid. However, I only get to check it once every couple of weeks. Admittedly, I've only ever gotten one mailed request -- for validation of Clive Groves violet collection for national collection status. The e-mail account was set up for me by the society, and for quite some time, I haven't been able to do anything with it. Now that you've brought the subject up, I'm starting to get a little worried about why that is so. I'll have to send out some e-mails and see if I can find out what has happened. For now, if anyone has any questions, I can be reached by my personal e-mail (just click on the link "MemberTom" for this posting)
As for checking on names, I should be able to do that (provided I haven't lost my files in our move). Before the move, I was working on getting the violet checklist into a more user-friendly database form.
Thanks for that gentle nudge -- I've been "asleep at the wheel" for too long. I'll let you know, what I find out.
Take care, Tom

Thanks Tom,
your website page ( Viola odorata 'Sulphurea' X 'Clive Groves' F2 ) is very interesting for me. It shows that we should not stop with the first cross between two selected parents and that better results may possibly be produced by crossing the F1 seedlings back to each parents or by crossing two of the seedlings with each other.
I crossed last spring, 'Annie' ( a red odorata type ) with viola odorata 'incompta' ( a white wild odorata from south of France, with twisted upper petals ), and now i'm waiting the germination at next spring ... and ...
I'm crossing my fingers to !
And i'm dreaming about F2 in 2007 ...
--
Denis

Dear Members of the Violet Society,

Please let me introduce myself. My name is Jim McKenney and I garden in the suburbs just north of Washington, D.C., USA. I discovered the Violet Society while Google-ing for information about Parma violets. You have no idea how happy I am to learn that so many others are working to keep violet culture alive and making sure that violets remain a well-loved part of our twenty-first-century gardens.

Although I grow some other violets (Viola pedata, V. dissecta, and of course pansies), I am currently in a very intense sweet violet phase with emphasis on Parma violets. I am trying Parma violets here for the third time. The last time I tried, over ten years ago, I grew fine plants but lost them during the winter to poor culture inside the house. Prior to that, I had tried some cultivars outside in the garden (Lady Hume Campbell, Marie Louise among others) and lost those during the winter.
This third trial has the Parma violets in a cold frame.
Although I have a fairly extensive personal horticultural library (including a copy of the first edition of the Allen-Browns' The Violet Book which was once owned by Henry Mitchell), until Google came along I was having trouble finding good information about Parma violet culture for my area. When I started to read the archives of the postings to the Violet Society, I was overjoyed to see that there are other members here in Maryland. I'm hoping that they can guide me to success with these plants.
Violets are only one of my many gardening interests. Two months ago, I put together a web site; please take a look at:
http//:www.jimmckenney.com

All of the images on that site are from my garden except for several of the animal images and one or two of local scenery.

I am looking forward to many enjoyable postings on this forum in the future.

Here is a link that might be useful: My Virtual Maryland Garden

I'll cross my fingers too, Denis. I'd love to see what comes from your crosses. Make sure to post pictures for us all to see.
And I agree, it is definitely worth the trouble to grow an F2 population (or backcross). I liked my F1 odorata a lot, but the variation and potential I've seen in just a small population of the F2 (less than a dozen), is a lot more exciting to me.
I'm glad to hear that there are others, like you, out there playing around with hybridizing violets.
Take care, Tom

Jim,
I got interrupted while typing and didn't get to see your posting. I'm not too far from you; I'm in Washington county, Maryland. So, I'll be watching especially closely to see how your Parma's grow. I've tried a double Parma and Nathalie Casbas' single, "Feline". But sadly, I've killed them both. I did get a few blooms before they died, and they had a very pleasant scent. So, I'm sure I'll have to try them again. For now, since I'm focusing on violet hybridizing, I'm growing more fertile types. Let us know how the Parma's do.
Thanks and take care, Tom

So many informations !!!! :-)

Welcome Jim :-) Feel free to post, I'll be less alone ;-) Yes, parmas are not so easy to overcome but it's not impossible in zone 7. About dissecta: I saw it on ebay where a guy were selling seeds. I thought: "that one must have something to do with viola dancing geisha". Unfortunately, I haven't be able to buy it :-/ Sh-- balls ;-))

Mike: ok, you're right :-) Anyway, I have time before seeing if something interesting is coming. I'd like so much to have a great surprise with my Doreen X la France.

Tom: I just wouldn't have imagine F2 were so different from F1 :-) I'm glad to learn many things here :-)

All the best :-)
Thierry.

Welcome Jim. To save wandering off-topic, I've started a new one just for you - go see....

Tom - ah! - Many thanks for that. Somewhat likewise, I think it would be a good idea to start a registrar's topic. I'm sure you can think of a good name. I would do it myself, but I think it would be better if you did it, then you can elect to have responses emailed to you automatically. I'm not trying to load you with work; just trying to keep it all in one place. I'll chip in later. Just a thought.

Good suggestion, Mike. (the registrar topic)
I'll start one, but before that... I've got a few wrinkles to iron out.

I know there's only a "trickle" of Viola hybridizing going on in the world, but I'm really looking forward to seeing a bunch of new Viola added to the registry.
Thanks, Tom

Now to steer the thread back to its original topic... Mrs. Pinehurst and similar odorata X sororia hybrids.
There are four "Governor Herrick" type violets currently in the Viola registry. I'll list them below. If I'm not mistaken, all of these violets are presumed to be of mixed, Viola odorata and Viola sororoia parentage. It would seem (since Bournmouth Gem is a selection from Governor Herrick) that there have only been 3 violets introduced from the direct cross. I'm really looking forward to seeing some more of these.
Looking back over some of my [poor] hybridizing records, it appears that I had no success using odorata 'Sulphurea' as the seed parent (with sororia). However, I just planted seeds from two, apparently successful, crosses of sororia (as seed parent) with odorata (as pollen). I think Jeff Parkes had success using odorata as the seed parent with pedata pollen. Viola pedata has 54 chromosomes like Viola sororia. His hybrid is the flower you see in the upper right of the Violet Forum page. Has anyone other than Thierry done any odorata crosses with North American Viola species??

Here are the registered 'Governor Herrick' types:

Bournmouth Gem (syn. Bournmouth Blue?) Origins unknown (1947) A selection from Governor Herrick with rich purple flowers on long stems. It is claimed that this particular cultivar has a slight perfume, which is more pronounced after rain.

FreyÂs Fragrant Frey (Illinois) U.S.A. (1925). A seedling from ÂGovernor HerrickÂ. Grey-mauve flowers. Despite the tedious name, without any trace of a fragrance.

Governor Herrick (syn. General Herrick?)U.S.A. (1910) A highly regarded commercial variety. Deep bluish-purple flowers. Blooms born on long, stiff stems. Long lasting beyond any of the "Sweet Violets" Unscented.

Mrs Pinehurst (syn. Mrs Pinchurst?) Origins unknown. Large blue flowers.

Thank you so much for those precious informations Tom :-)
I'm so glad to have them ! Very nice of you.

All the best.
Thierry.

Tom,

Some notes of mine, based on literature and talking to growers:

'Governor Herrick':
Some plants produce no runners at all (in agreement with early descriptions of the cultivar). Branching rhizome, large shiny evergreen heart-shaped leaves, deep bluish-purple flowers up to 3.5cm across, on stiff stems, from November to March under glass; longer lasting as cut flowers than scented single sweet violets; resistant to spider mites. Named after a governor of Ohio.

'Bournemouth Gem':
...Similar but flowers a little earlier.

These hybrids tend to lose what little scent they have soon after picking. These violets were very popular, but that probably contributed to the public's sense, in the first half of the 20th Century, that violets were losing their scent.

I'd be pleased to help with the register in due course, if you would like.
[ come on - where's that thread :) ]

You would be most welcome to host it at my Violaceae site - link below, but we'd need to discuss what server facilities it needs. Perhaps drop me an email, as I'm sure the database details would, to most people, be as boring as counting red spider mites :)
.

Good evening, to help you to include/understand the genetics, recover a book of biology of college(lycée 2nd ). "Mendel", that will avoid you the silly things. And a detail, nothing says that there was not autofecondation. Did you castrate your female? Even if there is many system limiting the autofecondation in plant, there is always a share of it.

I'd be pleased too in helping for the registar, as already offered before but you know....

About your wish to see more new cultivars added to the registrar Tom, there should be things linked with the International Violet Conquest...The first edition took place during the previous international meeting and the second edition is planed for Portugal in 2007! So violets folks are welcomed to submit their selections...in a somewhat "official" way :-)
I am in charge with this contest...Hhmm..I think I should drop few lines in another posting to talk about the previous event...the results and so on!!
Cheers

...definitely, Natha - a new topic on the International Violet Conquest, please!

Yan: I never said my crosses couldn't have been the result of autofecondation, not at all :-) In the end "we never can say" and "wait and see".
I just don't believe much in that way and tickled Denis in a friendly manner :-)
Castration ? no way lol. I don't feel it so don't do it :-)
Take it easy yan, always, and care as well.
Thierry.

Hello Limyan,
As with Thierry, I too, always consider that there is a good chance of autofecondation/self-pollination. I always reserve my judgement until I've seen the offspring.
With almost all of my violet and pansy crosses, I emasculate/castrate the blooms of the seed parent. This way, I am more likely to actually get the hybrid that I am intending. Still, there is always a chance of "selfing". So, cross your fingers for us (wish us luck).
Thanks, Tom

Tom: LOL !
That's just the opposite :-) My english is so declining that people misunderstand me ?? ;o)
I do not emasculate the flowers I cross. I may be wrong but I don't believe much in autofecondation with violet's chasmogamous blooms, I don't mean it's not possible but what the hell, it's riskless I think.
However, you're definitively right when you castrate your pansies: self-pollination is really important with that kind of flower :-)
Yan is also making crosses and succeeded in some of them...what about talking about them Yan :-)

bye bye folks :-)
Thierry.

YES, I selected some violets; "odo."La Valade "and" Camille ". But I cheeks not the aprentis wizard. I let play natural injury. Indeed I enormously sow seeds which come from the intermediate stage of flowering, cleistogame/chasmogame, it is at these times that foreign pollen could enter, follows from there abundant sowings and a obervation of the descent. The probability of obtaining something again is weak bus the variations are sometimes negligible but there was a genetic mixing which will be beneficial for a new generation. I conceives that when is restricts at a balcony this is less easy to implement.

Merry Xmas! ;-) XYan

Damned ! I've just have forgotten the "strange" way you're used to cross your violets. I'm brainless sometimes, should really add read-write memory ;-))
Well, why not :-) I guess it's just a question of time 'n' it's running after us. I do prefer the easier way so I won't try it.

Hello Yan,

welcome on GardenWeb Violet Forum.
I'm very happy to meet you on the net

and see you later in Toulouse

Best regards
Denis

HI dear Denis! and what about "rue des violettes" ?
Toulouse! -_^ what will happen in toulouse? ;-)

HaP Xmas! Yan