Thanks to the mine at home, he has gerbera.

African chrysanthemum is a very common and impressive flower. If you happen to pass by a new store, you are likely to find them in a flower basket with "opening luck" hanging in front of the door.

The gerbera in the flower basket is a variety of cut flowers. The so-called cut flower is to cut the flower from the plant with the stem. After all, there are many people who look at the flowers, but few people grow them, so cutting the flowers can make everyone appreciate them. Traditional cut flowers are most famous for rose, chrysanthemum, gladiolus and carnation, together known as the four largest cut flowers in the world.

But everyone says, isn't it common sense that there are five of the four heavenly kings? Yes, today's protagonist, African Chrysanthemum, is the fifth member of the four cut flowers.

Gerbera. Picture: smiley

My hometown is in Africa

As the name implies, gerbera is native to Africa, but it also has relatives in China. The genus Gerbera in which African chrysanthemum is located used to be called Gentiana, and G. anandria is widely distributed in China. Its leaves and gerbera are all attached to the ground, and a single head blossoms on a slender pedicel, just like a mini version of African chrysanthemum.

Dingcao. Picture: smiley

Unfortunately, Dingcao is not an honest guy, its low-end version of the image of African chrysanthemum only appears in the spring, in the autumn it will be transformed into a different look. As a result, several species with spring and autumn dimorphism, such as Scutellaria paniculata, were removed from the genus.

The group owner was kicked out of the group and had to change the group name, and Gerbera was immediately renamed to flint. Although Dingcao has left, African chrysanthemum still has some Chinese relatives, but it is relatively rare, basically in Yunnan.

Orange gerbera. Picture: Fan Wen / wikmedia

The way of breeding

The discovery of Gerbera should be attributed to Robert Jameson, a plant enthusiast who really owns a mine at home. At the end of the 19th century, when he was mining gold in the Barberton area of South Africa, he accidentally found some beautiful wild flowers blooming around the gold mine, so he collected some and sent them to the botanical garden. After experts decided that this was a new species, they named it jamesonii as a tribute.

Jameson, who has a mine at home. Picture: gerbera.org

So the gerbera also has the English name Barberton Daisy. Picture: smiley

The petals of wild African chrysanthemum are very slender, the color is usually orange-red, and the plants look weak. We can now see all kinds of flirtatious gerbera in the florist, thanks to the breeding of horticultural techniques.

Slender wild African chrysanthemum. Picture: Rooivos / wikmedia

Shortly after the discovery of gerbera, Kew Garden, one of the world's most famous botanical gardens, began the cultivation of gerbera, followed by the participation of France and other European countries. Around the 1970s, several countries developed gerbera varieties suitable for cut flowers and potted plants. Gerbera is not alone in breeding. It is accompanied by G. viridifolia, which belongs to the same genus.

Cross breeding makes African chrysanthemum colorful. Today's African chrysanthemum has high stem type suitable for cut flowers and short stem type suitable for potted plants, as well as single, semidouble, double, red, orange, yellow, pink and white colors, as well as dark and light colors. These characters are arranged and combined together. You can imagine how rich the varieties of gerbera are now.

All kinds of gerbera. Picture: David J. Stang & Dinesh Valke & Michael Wolf & Varun Pabrai / wikmedia

As a member of the Compositae family, the flower of African chrysanthemum is actually a head, so the character of "double" is actually divided according to the number of tongue-shaped flowers (each "petal" is actually a flower).

Like the wild type, single African chrysanthemum has two rounds of ligulate flowers on the outermost part of the flower; semidouble African chrysanthemum has some smaller ligulate flowers in the center of the flower; double African chrysanthemum has 5-7 whorls of ligulate flowers, even the whole inflorescence is ligulate. In recent years, African chrysanthemum has also cultivated more peculiar feather petals and twisted petals, which are much higher than the original wild type.

Feather petal (left) and torsion petal (right) African chrysanthemum. Picture: wing8.com

Well, it's supposed to be the fifth largest cut flower.

By the 1990s, Gerbera had established its status as a cut flower. In 1993, 135 million cut gerbera flowers were produced in Japan; in 1995, the output value of gerbera in the Netherlands was close to 100 million US dollars. There should be no dispute that African chrysanthemum has expanded the title of "four cut flowers" to "five".

China is not too late for the use of gerbera. Since the 1920s, we have introduced many varieties of African chrysanthemum one after another and gave it a Chinese name-Fulang Flower. The name began to be used in the 1980s at the latest, and I couldn't find its exact origin, but later merchants used it to open their minds, what perseverance is not afraid of hardship, what Wangfu, maybe African chrysanthemum will become a standard member of the opening flower basket.

"on which number will ta like me?" Picture: Dinesh Valke / wikimedia

In addition, the image of African chrysanthemum also appears in some ACG works, such as the game "LoveLive!" in which Takasaka Sui Naiguo holds the card of African chrysanthemum.

The orange gerbera goes well with the king's hair. Picture: "LoveLive!"

Players of mobile games might as well try inserting a bottle of beautiful African chrysanthemum on the table, which may be able to suck away the "African flavor" from you.

This is the 256th article in the fourth year of the species calendar, from @ Hanxiao, author of the species calendar.

Although everyone is actively guessing the theme, no one has guessed it so far. It's really a tragedy.

In order to reduce the difficulty of the game, starting from today, Calendar Niang will post a clue about the theme of "species Calendar 2019" at the end of the article, as well as a prize contest.

1/6

Clue

Key words of today

Temple BC753

The memory of ancient Rome is sealed in marble, even if there are only ruins everywhere, it can still recreate the glory of that year. Found twisted fossil traces in white marble? Don't be surprised, it's a more ancient memory. Marble comes from the calcareous remains of corals, foraminifera or shells. After thousands of years of condensation and rock formation, marble has to undergo high temperature, high pressure and secondary crystallization before it becomes what it is today.

There is a prize to answer today.

Q: what is your most impressive birthday species in four years? tell the story of you and it in the message area.

After reading today's clues and award-winning answers, you must have something you want to say. Everyone is welcome to leave messages and get the highest likes within 24 hours. Calendar Niang will give Ta a new species calendar for free.

Today's "propositional composition" can not be written? Never mind!

Calendar Niang today's avatar

Compositae sunflower