


LOS ANGELES 
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Espaliered plant grown in a glasshouse needs protection from glaring sun. 
WHAT SHALL WE CALL OUR EPIPHYLLUM HYBRIDS? 
Through the ages, botanists, horticulturists 
and even amateur hybridizers, have always tried 
to improve on the works of Old Mother Na- 
ture. The great cactus family has not escaped. 
The plants, themselves, are somewhat weird in 
form, but it was soon found that, at least in one 
particular group, great steps were being taken 
towards real beauty. It was noted that the 
Epiphyllum, which already produced lovely day 
or night blooming flowers, could be crossed 
with species of other genera to produce day 
blooming flowers with color. Inter-breeding by 
cross-pollination with Hy/ocereus and Seleni- 
cereus, both night blooming, produced larger 
flowers. Crossing with Hel/ocereus, or ‘Sun 
Cereus,” produced a great color range of day 
blooming hybrids. Earliest hybridizers claimed 
to also use the Aporocactus—Rat Tail,” the 
Zygocactus— ‘Christmas Cactus,” and the Echi- 
no psis—'‘Easter Lily Cactus’? which is a small 
type of “Barrel Cactus,” in crosses with Hy/o- 
cereus or Selenicereus, either with or without 
the use of the Epiphyllum. We do not seem to 
have any of the results of such crosses here in 
America, therefore we presume that, here at 
least, these hybrids have been so interhybridized 
as to have lost their habit and form. Hybridists 
of today are using still other plants for crossing, 
such as the new Chiapasia hybrids. 
The wondrous flowers produced by all these 
years of interbreeding have at last taken the 
public fancy by storm, but their great popularity 
has aroused a question. . . . What shall we call 
these lovely flowers with their strange parent- 
hood? If these blooms had been the result of 
crossing Epiphyllums with Epiphyllums, they 
could still carry their parent’s name, for a rose 
crossed with a rose is still a rose. So it is with 
a cabbage, but a rose crossed with a cabbage 
(if it could be done) would no longer be either 
a rose or a cabbage. 
The name Epiphyllum is applied to a distinct 
group of plants with very definite characters . 
all true species. The Epiphyllum is an estab- 
lished genus of its own but these hybrids are 
mostly the result of crossing Epiphyllums with 
a variety of plants, sometimes seemingly entire- 
ly unrelated, but always from different genera, 
so we see they cannot truly be called Epiphyl- 
lums in the correct usage of the word. Thus we 
start out on a quest for a new name for our 
lovely pets. 
First, we must search botanical history for a 
clue. We find that the name Epiphyllum was 
first used in 1689 by Hermann when he listed 
the name Epsphyllum americanum in “Par. 
Botavius Prodrumus.” This work is so old that 
the original copies were written by hand—a true 
collector's item! 
In 1753, Haworth used Cactus phyllanthus 
Linnaeus as a type species for his genus Epsphyl- 
lum in “Species Plantarum’ —page 469. 
The genus Epiphyllum was definitely recog- 
nized and established by Haworth in ‘Synonym 
Plant Succulentas’”—page 197, in 1812, therein 
giving credit for the name to Hermann (1689) 
—thus; Epiphyllum (Hermann) Haworth. 
Later, Phyllocactus—Link was erected as a 
