KINKUJAKU-金孔雀
 

This plant is described by the vendor as:" KINKUJAKU is valuable variety which has tiger stripe on small foliages called bean leaf. Usually bean leaf variety with variegation is very very expensive like RYOKUHONOSHIMA ($2000) or KINKIRIN ($15000) etc. But KINKUJAKU is still reasonable and good to start with. To make them produce nice gold tiger stripe, you should give them blight light enough. New leaf come up with solid green color and will produce tiger stripe as getting old. (This feature is called NOCHI-HAZE) The variegation is the most important part for Fukiran. That is why lightning is very important issue for all variegated variety. KINKUJAKU's tiger stripe is called NORI-FU which means variegation appears only on surface. Have great feature in this adorable appearance" (I'm not correcting anything.)

We have discussed before the light requirements of Neofinetia as it relates to variegation. Some variety requires less light while some others, like this Kinkujaku require a lot of light. I own this plant, but it is solid green with very faint tiger stripping. It is in a western facing window and gets a lot of bright light, but maybe it needs a longer duration?

This plant is up for auction on eBay. It has been grown in a lot of light.

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It is fascinating to be able to manipulate a plant's appearance by changing light levels.

Mine is grown in high light for 12 hours and I'm able to get this look. T5 lamps even. It got brown rot though but it looks like it'll survive.


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the sturdy look of the bean leaf together with this golden upperside makes this one I really love looking at ;).

btw, up until last year my neo's were all grown directly behind an south-east facing window where they got full sun until 2 pm without burning the leaves... the only thing that happened was that my amami furan took on a very black colouration on its leaves, but this has reverted since it has a shadier growing area now... no damage at all.

so maybe you should try to up it's light levels a bit at a time until u get a nice colouration?

greetz,
Dries

Pictures of my plant. When I got this plant, it had very faint coloration. In fact I thought the leaves that showed that coloration were on their way to dying. I took it here to my breakfast room to take a closer look, and noticed that the leaves were all showing variegation changes.

While I have it in its "winter rest", I think I'll put a grow light on this space to see if that will help enhance its variegation.

Thank you both for replying.

Here is a side view with its flat mates: to the right, Hououden 鳳凰殿, behind it is Gojo-Fukurin 御城覆輪, and Higashidemiyako 東出都--which is my third plant and in need of more light.

Mine was a pollen donner to my kinrokaku that I lost to rot. The pod was germinated by a lab. Haven't heard from them in a while but the pods worked. So I should have kinrokaku x k-jaku crosses in the future.


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I am very glad that Jayfar won this plant!

Very interesting plant and info. I would have thought that the plant was dying with the yellow coloration.

Beautiful plant, Matt.

Oh no, this one looks quite healthy. The trick is high light for this one. Mine gets a fair amount of light and looks very much like this. It is contrary to setsuzen which likes lower light to show her stripes.


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And that is the reason why I colllect Neofinetia. You really have to learn each variety in order to provide the right conditions to achieve the proper form for the plant. You just taught me the difference between this plant and a Setzuzen regarding variegation. (Thanks Ryan). I was puzzled that my Setzusen was turning all kinds of variegation and my Kinkujaku was turning greener! Now I've moved the Kinkujaku to a brighter location. I hope it gets that golden coloration like Jayfar's new acquisition.

Interesting, per the description, that the variegation only occurs on the leaf surface. As a result it appears, at least from what I see in the SE photos, that the undersides of even the most yellowed leaves appear green.

Hopefully I'll be able to provide sufficient light to maintain the variegation and add it to new leaves as they age as well.

I like that cosmic companies are doing these things.


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I find it "most appreciable when plant have more than 2 features." I was at a gallery opening for a really good friend of mine who is paper cut artist in the Japanese style. She had a paper cutting that used fine paper cuts across a beautifully subtle, mottled paper, yielding two points of view. Upon viewing her work, I heard myself say: "Janice (she's the artist) your use of the knife and arranging your paper cut to enable two points of view is highly appreciable."

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Heh, Jay remembers, "All your base belong to us."

I would love to get that Shishedo Sedirea japonica perfume. Perhaps Kristen and Dr. Glen could import some for us to purchase.

Are those remarks only a little racist?...Jean

Oops. I was thinking not, but to be sure I've edited/deleted portions of 2 previous posts of mine. My sincere apologies to anyone who found my remarks offensive.

Not just yours Jayfar...Jean

Jay-- I was examining my Kinku-jaku last night and can report the same re the variegation on the top of the leaf and very little on the bottom-- it rounds the edge of the leaf but then the underside of the leaf is pretty much a solid green.

Speaking of variegation-- found a fan on my Fugaku that is entirely white. not a single bit of green in the form of a stripe or dot.

No matter what you say even with the most genuine intention, you will always find someone who is offended by it, especially nowadays! We have to apologize for everything and nothing, there is no more room is our society for humor, it is sad...my apologies is I offend anyone with my opinion!

Yep, mine just arrived minutes ago and that's what I'm seeing too. On the underside just at the very edge, like a picotee on a flower, and a little more at the tip.

Fabulous. Close up pic please when you get a chance.

You must have a direct connection from San Diego to Philadelphia. When I get my order, it goes from San Diego to Indianapolis and then it is driven to fort Wayne.

Is your new acquisition as nice as described and pictured?

I understand Priority Mail tracking isn't always a complete reflection of the whole path, but mine always show Oceanside -> San Diego -> Philadelphia. I had this batch sent Priority Mail Express, so it took 1 day and is delivered before noon.

Very nice arrangement of growths and possibly 3 spikes starting (unless they're new growths instead, can't tell for sure).

That's the difficulty of growing neos...fans and spikes get nearly equal amount of excitement from me.


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So your new Kinkujaku is NOT hiberating for the winter? This is interesting. I guess purveyors of fine Neofinetia orchids do not observe "winter rest"?

I am looking at the Neofinetia I got last week, and I did notice the roots appeared to have an active growth coloration. Whereas the plants that have been with me before Winter are not actively growing. This is a very interesting observation. Jayfar, are you going to let this one go onto winter rest?

You know, I'm ashamed to admit to laziness, but I still haven't got around to setting up a bright, cool, enclosed spot, so if they do get a winter rest, it will be a short one.

My hokage particularly has continued to put out new long pink-tipped roots, including one that runs straight up along the axis.

Ryan do you think that the white growth will survive? I have one that has just started on a Tiaga that is mostly white and I am a little concerned about it.Is there anything that can be done to make them produce a little bit of green?...Jean

The fan is growing very slowly as can be expected not only because it is nearly pure white but because the sister and mother fans are also pretty starkly variegated-- much more green but the variegation is very clearly defined. If the fan is never separated from the mother can, it'll live as a parasite to the mother fan but it can survive that way. However many neos will randomly separate from one another, which I suppose is a survival method. There are many instances of extremely variegated fans that are maintained on a group of plants so I'm hopeful it'll be just fine.


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Dr. Glenn said that he saw a vendor in Japan pull a beautiful all yellow growth off of an expensive Neo and just toss it. He was astounded and appalled, but the grower said that without green, the growth wouldn't survive. *I* have two lines of reasoning to the contrary (no direct evidence, but here goes): (1) Just because there does not appear to be any green doesn't mean there are no chloroplasts. If there are chloroplasts, the growth can photosynthesize and survive. 2) Even if the growth doesn't have any chloroplasts, it is still attached to the rest of the plant and can be supported by photosynthate made there--kinda like a freeloading child :) I just couldn't bring myself to discard a seemingly healthy (and beautifully colored!) growth.

Glenn told me about this before and I was shocked and amazed. I have no plans of removing excessively variegated fans.

KINKUJAKU-金孔雀
 

I had the same reaction when I saw Dr. Glenn pull seed pods off Neofinetia. I even bought a couple of those plants before he snapped them off! A Kinroukaku and a Yubae Sangetsu.

I think I know what made them do this... For Glenn, as an orchid vendor it's crucial to grow his orchids to the maximum of their potential to grow better, more beautiful plants so they are more precious. In the same way the man in Japan tossed the yellow growth, was it for optimal looks in the shows or for selling as well... This is because both cases, an entirely yellow growth (which btw can't have enough chloroplasts to survive on its own, the chloroplasts give the green color to the leaves so if the leaves are yellow that means there aren't enough there to capture and reflect the light (capture all light except for the green light) for the production of sugars for the plant) and a seedpod both take up a lot of energy away from the growing potential of the plant. So if they left the growth/seedpod, the plant might have grown less for the next season.

I hope I cleared up some thought about the seemingly strange actions :p ... but either way the plants probably wouldn't have died from not doing this, so it's each growers decision to act this way on their plant for beneficial growth or to enjoy some nice extra features on the plant...

greetz,
Dries

Excellent analysis Dries. I agree with your assertion. I asked Dr. Glenn, Why he would pull seed pods off plants, Dr. Glenn, replied, "Growing Neofinetia from seed is a long process. As a vendor, I can import/acquire plants from nurseries that are ready to bloom in less than a month...it would take several years to have a plant large enough to sell if I grew them from seed."

Welcome to hybridizing. At least it isn't 7-10 years as it is for Paphs...

As far as growths that are all white (called Ghost Leaves) I've read somewhere (maybe in the article from Jason Fischer) that Ghost leaves are undesirable. Maybe because they don't have chloroplasts, maybe just because they look weird, I don't know.

In Japan, these growths are not desirable because they add stress to the mother plant because it sucks the nutrition away from the entire plant since they do not produce energy from lack of chlorophyll ... Eventually most of these growths die off by themselves after 2-3 years. Their reasoning is that if taken off they will offshoot stronger growths with some greens that will contribute to strength of plant. The ghost growths will not produce new fans usually. However in my opinion, these ghost leaves add an aesthetic to the overall plant and I keep them for a visual feast ... They look stunning among the green leaves. Most of them will die off a natural death anyways so enjoy them while they last. If the plant is weak, it is best to remove them.


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