Anthurium papillilaminum "Colon" x carlablackiae "Tropicarla"

papillilaminum "Colon" x carlablackiae "Tropicarla"

The seed parent came to me from my friend Jill, back when I needed rebuilding more than I needed plants, in the wake of a rough 2024 - she gave me both without quite meaning to. "Colon pap" is what the trade calls it, named for Panama's Colón Province, a coastal pap from the Caribbean side of the divide, where it seems half the good species in this genus decided to live. It's a clean, honest representation of the species. No embellishment needed.

The pollen parent has a sillier story. I bought it off an Ecuadorian nursery at the tail end of a plant show, told it was seed grown, and knew within a week of getting it home that it was not - divided at the stem, plain as day. Not enough to call it wild collected, but enough to keep me a little suspicious of that table going forward. I've got a handful of flowering-size carlablackiae now and I try to keep them straight in my head, which is how "Tropicarla" happened - a Rays broadcast, an announcer saying Tropicana Field one too many times, and me shouting eureka to an empty greenhouse like a lunatic. Might be my best name yet.

The plant itself explains all of this far better than I just did. Enjoy it, and whatever it goes on to make.