Rochea
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| Standard Cyclopedia of Horticulture |
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Rochea (named after de la Roche, French botanist). Syn., Kalosanthes. Crassulaceae. Succulent shrubby plants suitable for the greenhouse. Leaves opposite, connate at the base, oblong-ovate or lanceolate: fls. rather large, aggregated in corymbose-capitate cymes, white, yellow, rose, or red; calyx 5-parted or 5-cleft; corolla salver-shaped, the elongated claws of the petals connate with the calyx-tube, limb spreading: follicles many-seeded.—About 4 or 5 species, S. Afr. Rocheas are amongst the showiest of our summer-flowering greenhouse plants, and are very easy to propagate. If plants are desired from a single root, cuttings about 4 inches long should be selected in March, and potted singly in sandy peat. The small pots should be placed near the glass, in a night temperature of 50°. Do not keep them too wet, as they are of a fleshy nature, and are liable to rot. In a few weeks, the plants will be rooted and the points may be cut out to encourage breaks. A few days after they are cut back, repot into a pot two sizes larger, using two parts fibry loam, one of sand, and one of broken charcoal, adding a sixth part of sheep-manure. After they are rooted, keep them near the glass, in a night temperature of not over 40°, when this is possible. When all danger of frost is past, set them outdoors on a bed of ashes in the full sun, making some provision to protect them from rainstorms, so as to prevent water lodging in the points of the shoots, which is liable to bring about conditions favorable to disease. Toward the end of September, have the plants housed in their winter quarters; all that is necessary during the winter is to keep them from freezing. In spring, the points of the shoots may be cut out again, to encourage more breaks and soon after they may receive another shift. Treat them as advised above, and when the pots are well filled with roots, they may be watered with manure-water as advised for ixoras. Rocheas may be flowered the second summer after the cuttings are struck, and after flowering the plants may be cut back to 6 inches above the pot. These cut-back plants may be shifted along, after they break, and be grown into large specimens. Fine plants of rochea may also be grown in the following manner: Take a 10- or 12-inch pot, and fill it with the compost advised above, the last 2 inches being pure sand. Insert the cuttings as thick as they can be pricked into the pot. The cuttings may be secured from a plant that has flowered. Breaks will start all over the stems of such plants, and in the fall after flowering they will be large enough to use for cuttings. In eighteen months this pot of cuttings will come in flower and will have more than doubled the number of shoots. Aphides are the only insect pest that molest the rocheas, and these may be destroyed by fumigating with tobacco in some of its forms. These plants require at all times abundance of fresh air, and if this is not given, they will be attacked by fungous disease. (George F. Stewart.) R. falcata, DC. equals Crassula falcata.—R. hybrida albiflora is said to be a hybrid between R. jasminea and R. odoratissima.—R. odoratissima, D.C. Somewhat shrubby, 12-20 in.: lvs. connate, erect-spreading, linear-lanceolate or subulate: fls. 1 in. long, fragrant, pale yellow or cream-colored. Cape.
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References
- Standard Cyclopedia of Horticulture, by L. H. Bailey, MacMillan Co., 1963
