Hi Patty, I do have Rasha Chabo Nishiki. It is sometimes difficult to ferret some of these names. Nishiki is used a lot to name many Furan. But when it is used in conjunction with other words, it's meaning is modified. Interesting that you connected Nishiki with variegation. I had a different understanding in that I found it translated to the English word "brocade" which I understand to be a rich, highly textured, patterned cloth as opposed to velvet or silk.

Hi Matt, Does your Rasha Chabo Nishiki look like my picture? The idea of variegation came from doing a search on each word in the name. I searched Neofinetia Nishiki and several plants, all variegated were found. So? I ass-usmed. The Rasha was rough texture.

I contacted Al and he is certain this plant is correctly labeled, I may be gullible but I trust him and if he says it's correct, that's good enough for me. I was a bit concerned I had purchased a small Shutennou! Lol

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Al once told me of customers changing the tags on his Neos. He was very offended because these customers didn't seem to think he knew his plants. I understand why he keeps them behind a chained area now.

Sorry, I have found zero information about Rasha-Chabo-Nishiki.

I can say though that the name seems to carry a description as you were guessing. Rasha implies a texture to the leaves. That one seems to be clear with no issues in regards to this plant.

Chabo implies the shape of the plant. However, Chabo doesn't mean that the leaves are upright, but it rather means that the leaves are short, but not to the extent of a Bean leaf variety. "chabo" plants can have upright or curved leaves.

In Japanese horticulture, in many varieties of plants with shorter leaves will be described as Chabo. Literally, the translation of Chabo isn't "chicken" per se, but rather a specific breed of chicken, the Japanese bantam. The name isn't used to compare the shape of the plant to a chicken or its plumes, but rather it is comparing the size of the plant to a bantam. In the same way a true Bantam chicken breed is smaller than a standard breed, a Chabo plant variety, is smaller than a standard variety.

Nishiki, does in fact most often imply variegation. As far as I have seen, it has never been used to describe texture of a leaf, but in some cases it implies anthocyanin pigmentation or a particularly vibrantly colored flower. In all cases though, the implication is a unique pattern or color. I have no clue why it might have been applied to this variety name though.

Questions about this variety are probably going to be best answered by Seed Engei. The name does not bring up any meaningful results on google in Japanese or Korean, and the 15 or so books on Neos I have don't mention it. The only online result is an old Seed Engei price list.

Thank you once again Hakumin! Yes, I do think I'll email Satomi and see what she says about Rasha-Chabo-Nishiki.

Patty my plant looks just like your plant but it doesn't have as many growths. This one was very in-expensive.

Matt it is funny that your Tamakongo is larger than your Yodo-no-matsu. I thought my Tamakongo was pretty good size but this Yodo-no-matsu dwarfs it!

Hakumin, thank you! I wonder why there is no information on this plant. Oh and Nishiki does often imply variegation, see there Matt? Seed Engei might be the only answer here. Is Seed Engei where you purchased your plant? I wouldn't say this was very inexpensive, that was why I contacted Al, I wouldn't have paid this for a Shutennou of this size. The Yodo-no-matsu was less. God, it's hopeless, too many beautiful Neofinetia!

Wow! Great photography, Patty. I like the contrast and compare. If I didn't know better, I'd say the one of the right is Tomakongou! That is based on my plants. I'll have to do a similar photo of my Yodo and Toma.

Thank you Matt. It's just a iPhone picture. The Tamakongo is much smaller and the Yodo-no-matsu has a lot of smaller fans, I think there are 14 fans to this fatty. As much as I love the little bean leafs, this one is my new favorite. I was really happy to find it and my daughter had to reach it for me to even look at it. I'm a bit short. She is calling me Gollum now, lol with my precious. Kids!