Nature is tricky, all right – she always has something up her sleeve.
She sends a pest to eradicate the plant you thought was in the best health, then works a sudden cure on the sickly one you had given up for lost.
She plants one maverick in a batch of identical seedlings or one odd flower in a cluster; she changes plants on a whim and revels in her trickery.
But, she’s never a bore – not nature!
Mutation: Nature’s Favorite Prank
Mutations are one of nature’s favorite pranks. Perhaps you call them “sports,” which is perfectly correct, according to a recent dictionary.
These are mutations:
- A pink rosebush sprouts one branch with red flowers
- A green-leaved ivy geranium sends out one stem bearing white-rimmed leaves
- On a begonia with three flat, round leaves, the fourth comes out crimped and curled like lettuce.
A common example of an attractive mutation may be observed in the privet, which is more widely used than any other hedge plant in our country.
A plain green bush of privet will almost suddenly seem to have a branch that “sports” leaves margined or heavily splashed with a creamy or golden color.
Not To Be Confused With Hybrids
Mutations arise spontaneously on mature plants and affect one portion of a plant, such as a branch.
They are not to be confused with hybrids, which grow from seed resulting when two plants are crossed or mated. The change is sudden and transmissible.
That is, it can be passed on to generation after generation of new plants through vegetative propagation – cuttings – of the mutated portion of the plant.
Successful Mutation Of Calla Lily Begonia
The calla lily begonia is one of nature’s most successful tricks.
A semperflorens (wax) begonia once sent out a branch with leaves splashed and streaked with white.
Even more, the new leaves were pure white and, before unfolding, resembled the calla lily. A lovely plant to grow!
But alas, like many variegated mutations, somewhat temperamental – and more than somewhat difficult to propagate.
The white leaf portion is white because it lacks chlorophyll; without chlorophyll, it cannot “digest” the nourishment plants find in sunlight, water, and soil. It “has no stomach,” in other words.
For this reason, cuttings from plants that are variegated mutations must always be taken with the greatest possible proportion of green in the leaves.
When they reproduce their new characteristics through propagation, mutations are properly termed new plants” – and often christened with new names. Watch your plants.
If you discover among green leaves one patterned with yellow or white; or among plain leaves, one twisted up into a tube; or among somber leaves, one that assumes much brighter color or markings – watch to see whether that whole branch or portion of the plant is assuming the same new characteristics.
If it is, it may be propagated, and you have a mutation, a brand new member of the plant world!
44659 by Elvin Mcdonald