Anthurium magnificum "Mickey" x dressleri "Extremely Dark Dressleri"

magnificum "Mickey" x dressleri "Extremely Dark Dressleri"

The seed parent alone has a resume longer than most of us can claim. Wild-harvested something like 80 years ago, grown for years in the foyer of Mickey Carmichael's orchid nursery in Miami before Enid Offolter of NSE Tropicals saw it and walked away with a cutting some 20 years back, at which point the plant was already thought to be pushing 60. I won my piece of Enid's now-enormous clone in a bidding war at an International Aroid Society dinner and auction, and I'm not going to pretend I wasn't thrilled about it. With A. magnificum possibly comprising 20 or more subspecies and ecotypes floating around in trade, I'll admit a soft spot for this one in particular.

The pollen parent is Grant Abadal's ecotype hybrid of two wild collected dressleri, bred dark and, true to the tag, extremely dark. Dressleri itself is named for Dr. Robert Louis Dressler and was described by Dr. Thomas Croat in 1978 from a holotype out of the Colón province of Panama, near Rio Guanche. Named specimens of this species are everywhere and half of them are fussy in captivity, but the seed-grown ecotype crosses tend to grow with a lot more conviction. This cross puts pedigree on both sides of the pollen brush, which is really all I ask for.