Over the past 15 years Frances and I have collected sixty-five Echinopsis hybrids from six or more sources, the majority being Schicks and Paramounts. We are confident that fifty are from genuine original material imported into New Zealand. There are about ten that need further investigation and five that are dubious.

We are conscious that these plants are aging (aren't we all!) and steps need to be taken to protect them, as it is now virtually impossible to import such material from overseas. So in the spirit of the Society's motto "To grow. To study. To share." we will begin in the spring to propagate them in order to make them more available to Society members.

A group of members from Northland, Hawke's Bay, New Plymouth, South Taranaki, Wellington-Hutt Valley and Nelson Branches have indicated they would be willing to assist in growing these plants on for the benefit of members. It is hoped this will become an exercise for branches, not just individual members, and I apologise now if I have missed out anyone who indicated in Palmerston North they were willing to participate. It is also hoped that all branches will have some involvement.

I have a lot of information on these plants and the next stage for me is write an article for the November Journal setting out what material I have and what I know about the plants. Concurrently with the propagation we would like to compile an inventory of Echinopsis hybrids in New Zealand - or at least, in the hands of Society members. So I would be grateful to any members are willing to assist by having a look at the plants in their collections and letting me know by e.mail or letter the name of any Echinopsis hybrid they have I would be grateful. I am hoping that South Island collections and those belonging to older members may produce interesting results.

I would like to make a start on the Paramounts. I know that there were quite extensive importations of Paramounts into New Zealand in the 1960s, such as Paramount Morning Glory, Paramount Stars and Stripes, and other Echinopsis hybrids such as Green Gold (which is possibly from the Gates Nursery). However, the following Paramount hybrids were developed by Harry Johnson between 1955 and 1968 but I have never seen them in New Zealand: Tangerine (1957), Red Pygmy (1958), Red Meteor (1959), Betelgeuse (1961), Harlequin (1965) and Scarlet O'Hara, Blaze, Pink and White (1968).

Frances and I would like to emphasise this is a long term exercise. We are happy to make our plants available but it won't happen overnight.

Just before leaving for the Executive Committee meeting in Palmerston North I learned from Cactus World that a Hybrid Echinopsis Swap Circle has been established with the British Cactus and Succulent Society and it is proving very successful. I have been in touch with the convenor Elizabeth Pendleton who has been very helpful. She lists four benefits of the British scheme:

  1. Plants are available to members who want them but do not have them in their collections.
  2. Members become more aware of nurseries that stock Echinopsis hybrids, particularly Schicks. This is probably not so relevant in New Zealand because of the limited number of nurseries that seriously stock cacti. Elizabeth does make the point that the scheme has not disadvantaged nurseries because when members become aware of a nursery selling the plants they do purchase them.
  3. The exchange of information that allows wrongly labelled plants to be identified and hopefully that member being supplied with the correct plant.
  4. The promotion of friendship between members with a common interest and the wider distribution of plants within collections.
See Pendleton, Elizabeth J (2006): The Hybrid Echinopsis Swap Circle - a success story. Cactus World. 24(2): 57 - 63.

Paramounts

Any discussion of Echinopsis hybrids must begin with the Paramounts of Harry Johnson (1894-1977) who ran the Johnson Cactus Gardens at Paramount, California, from where he bred and marketed his "Paramount Hybrids" for many years. Harry Johnson was a master nurseryman and hybridiser of cacti. His first important plant was Echinopsis "Los Angeles" produced in the 1930s. That plant is generally accepted as a Paramount although it does not carry the Paramount prefix because it was not until 1949 that the area of Los Angeles where the nursery was became known as Paramount. The first Paramounts were offered in 1954, namely "Orange Paramount", "Red Pygmy", "Salmon Queen" and "Sunset". Harry Johnson produced 26 named Paramounts up to 1968, and nine more were produced after the nursery moved to Fallbrook and became the Cactilandia Gardens, but it is only the original 26 that are the true Johnson "Paramounts". I have no information as to any of the nine Fallbrook plants being imported possibly because it was not easily accessible being 60km from Paramount.

Harry Johnson called his Echinopsis/Lobivia hybrids "Lobiviopsis", but this name is invalid as it had been used earlier by Fric in 1934. If Lobivia and Echinopsis are accepted as valid generic names, then the correct botanical name for a "Paramount" is x Echinolobivia, otherwise they are simply hybrids of Echinopsis. While Harry Johnson kept meticulous records of his hybrids, he failed to record the varietal names on the records making it impossible to link the records with the named varieties, a very unfortunate occurrence. There is a common misunderstanding that Paramounts can be produced from seed. They can but they would not be the named Paramounts which can only be propagated from rooted offsets. If you could cross two plants of the same named variety, the seed would produce plants with a range in appearance from one of the original parents to the other parent. Some of the seedlings could very closely resemble the named variety but they would not be exactly the same. Apart from the war years Harry Johnson produced an annual catalogue and first used the name Paramount in 1951. I have copies of the 1957, 1958 and 1962 catalogues and would be interested in getting copies of any others that may exist in New Zealand. The situation is further complicated by the fact that in the 1962 catalogue is the following advertisement:

Paramount Hybrid Seed - Carefully selected seed from our best named varieties. A large proportion will be in bright pastel shades. All will be large colorful blossoms. Under good care the will flower in second or third year. ... 50 seeds ... 50 cents.

But of course they would not be any of the 19 named varieties produced up to 1962. We must also appreciate that the 26 or 35 named varieties were the result of thousands of crosses with only a few being selected. In 1996 I was given a list of some 800 Echinopsis hybrids by Louis S Zelenak, a California collector and Paramount enthusiast. This included some 18 Paramounts attributed to Harry Johnson, most of them post-1958. I do not know whether these plants were ever released commercially but expect they were just available to Californian collectors.

The plants were bred to be very free-flowering, with brilliant colours and large flowers, and here Harry Johnson succeeded admirably. The size of the flower compared to the size of the plant is very spectacular, and the plants are generally quite robust and easy to grow. Some pup freely, while others branch much more sparingly and are therefore much rarer.

Probably many of the "Paramounts" made their way to New Zealand in the 1950s and 1960s by mail order, or by direct import in your luggage when returning home. Paramount is reasonably central in Los Angeles and it was quite easy and cheap to hop into a taxi and fill your suitcase. Mrs Chesterman, a Wellington member of the Society at that time, told me that was what her brother used to do. Most of the clearly identified plants in my collection came from Mrs Chesterman. Other known importers were Mrs Okey in New Plymouth, Laurie Dephoff and Rob Russell in Auckland, Norm Stow in Christchurch and the Society, which balloted them out to members. It is quite possible that as a result of the endeavours of these people we may well have a better pool of Paramount hybrids than most places in the world. Hopefully when I have finished this exercise we will know.

Schicks

A natural extension of the Paramounts is the Schicks because they were almost entirely derived from Harry Johnson's Paramount hybrids and detailed records were kept of the crosses. Bob Schick began crossing the Paramount hybrids in 1977 to see if he could improve the range of colours, size and flowering time. This is a complex and time-consuming exercise with many hundreds of hybrids being produced, before individual plants with superior characters are retained and eventually given cultivar status. Bob Schick is a romantic and a thoroughly approachable fellow. His romantic streak is illustrated by the names of his plants. "Princess Anne" is not named after a member of the Royal Family but a young neighbour; "Chico Mendez" after a Brazilian conservationist who was killed because of his activities in trying to protect the rain forests; and "Wild Red Berry" after one of his favourite wrestlers Ralph "Wild Red" Berry. Members might like to muse over the origins of other names. Harry May in 1997 reports that Bob Schick had produced more than 200 named Schick Echinopsis cultivars, although at that point only 39 had been introduced commercially. I have been unable to find the exact number of plants produced commercially although the ISI Schick catalogue 1996 - 2004 lists 128. I also have a copy of the ISI Schick Hybrids catalogue for 2001 which has detailed notes on cultivation and a comprehensive flower appreciation tutorial developed by Bob, detailed descriptions of the plants and a glossary.

I first became aware of these plants in 1997 when I read about them in the March/April American Cactus and Succulent Journal. I became interested and decided to try and import the 1997 release. They were part of the Huntington Botanical Gardens 1997 offerings of International Succulent Introductions. My adventures in importing these plants were recorded in the August 1998 New Zealand Cactus and Succulent Journal. Schicks imported in 1997 were:

Afterglow
Chico Mendes
Enchantment
Infinity
Maria Piazza
Rosalie
Sonnet
Tondelayo		 Anastasia
Crepe Crusader
Galaxy
Intrigue
Nancy Scott
Samantha Smith
Sorceress
Traumeri		 Allusion
Desdemona
Gold Emblem
La Sonorisa
Oberon
Sierra Skyline
Spring Blush
Wild Red Berry		 Beautiful Dreamer
Don Juan
Icarus
Lochinvar
Peace Eros
Siren
Temptress
 		 Candlelight
Eclipse
Impulse
Madam Butterfly
Pink Diamond
Sleeping Beauty
Terpsicore
 

In 1998 I decided to try and complete the set and import the one Schick hybrid offered by the ISI in 1996 I had not obtained and the eight that were offered in 1998. It was then I struck problems. In 1997 MAF could not have been more helpful in assisting me import the plants. But by 1998 ERMA had come into existence and the young woman I was dealing with was completely intransigent. She insisted that in no way could cultivars be imported into New Zealand. I pointed out that of the most plants sold in garden shops are cultivars and her attitude seemed to be a remarkable turnaround in less than 12 months. Stuck with her attitude and the fact that the Lynfield quarantine facility closed down shortly afterwards I abandoned the exercise. I don"t know what the current position is about importing cultivars but it was not helped when some years ago the United States Agricultural Authorities refused to process the paperwork to allow the ISI plants to be exported. I also understand some attempt is being made to export plants to a German nursery so they could be available in Europe although recent information suggests this may be thwarted by tougher EU rules. As far as I am aware the only Schicks imported into New Zealand are the ones I imported in 1997 and it is unlikely there will be any more. In many instances we only have one plant and some have not produced offsets which makes our plans to propagate these plants and make them more widely available doubly important.

Other Echinopsis hybrids imported into New Zealand

I am only aware of four other Echinopsis hybrids being imported into New Zealand. "Green Gold" and "Golden Dream" came from the Howard E Gates nursery which was also in California. I believe these plants would have come in about the same time as the Paramounts were being imported. I have "Green Gold" in my collection and it is a plant with a very distinctive flower and numerous offsets, but I have never seen "Golden Dreamer". However the good news is it has been discovered in Nelson and I look forward to seeing the flowers later in the year.

The other hybrids are "Abbey Brook Buttercup" and "Abbey Brook Lemonade" from the Abbey Brook Nursery in Matlock, Derbyshire. Brian Fearn runs a very successful commercial nursery which I was fortunate to visit in 1984. He started hybridizing in the 1960s and said he had a limited range of material to work with but it did include "Green Gold" and "Golden Dream", Which makes the two plants we have in New Zealand even more important they be established to be used by future hybridizers. To that end I hope as a result of this exercise I hope to be able to settle some provenance on the plants I am unsure about. But of course many of the best hybrids come from unknown parents. Brian Fearn reckons that over the past 30 years he has flowered more than 120,000 seedlings but only 90 were considered worthy of a name - roughly one out of 1,300 seedlings. I also was pleased to note that one of his 1998 hybrids "King Midas" was a 4 -hybrid cross between "Lemonade" X "Darley Queen", a hybrid with pink and yellow flowers, X "Green Gold" X "Terra Cotta", three of which are in my collection. Unfortunately for reasons outlined earlier none of these later hybrids are available in New Zealand.

Other Echinopsis hybrids.

I have endeavoured to set out everything I know about the commercial Echinopsis hybrids that have been imported into New Zealand over the past 40 years. If anyone knows of any other introduced plants I would be grateful for the information. But of course that is not the end hybridising has been going on throughout the world. Other notable hybridizers include Margaret Martin (Wimborne) and Roy Mottram (Whitestone) in England, Mark Dimmitt and Maria Piazza (Cactus by Mueller) in America, and numerous German hybridisers about whom I know nothing. Some info on a Belgium grower of Echinopsis hybrids.

In the February Journal I hope to have an article on the New Zealand hybrids. This will be a short article because I have very little information. I only know of one commercial hybridiser in New Zealand who produced the Glenroy hybrids in Dunedin. The only plant I am aware of still being in existence is "Violet"s Beauty". But I have two other New Zealand plants "Bay Rose" and "Bay Bloom" which I got 10 years ago from I thought the Bay of Plenty Branch, but recent inquiries of Bay of Plenty members as to the breeder has not produced any answers. I do want to get hold of a copy of Southern Spine a magazine produced by Edna Pie in Oamaru. Hopefully it will be in the National Library. I am also intrigued by a cyclostyled document "Coffee Time" I have in my possession which I think also had its origins in Oamaru. After spending a whole day writing this article I think I deserve a beer. A couple of websites worth visiting are:


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