La Rinconada Victorias Santa Cruz, Bolivia What Are They? by Kit & Ben Knotts & Tonchi Ribero Click images to enlarge Photo credits with large images

Early in 2006, we began corresponding with first Chiqui Arroyo and then Tonchi Ribero in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. They wondered if the Victorias growing at the garden restaurant La Rinconada, just outside of Santa Cruz, might be the largest ever recorded, which they were! See The Largest Victoria Pads Ever Recorded!

Once we recovered from the initial excitement of seeing these magnificent plants in their gorgeous garden setting, we began to wonder what they were! Though we would presume them to be V. amazonica (Bolivia is known to be within its natural range), the La Rinconada plants aren't consistent with what we know as V. amazonica. Our hands-on experience is limited to plants of Brazilian origin and we have photos of wild plants from Brazil and Peru, but none from Bolivia. Still, we wondered about the variation in pad types, and asked Tonchi:

"I think that the Victorias we have are V. amazonica because they were collected up north in Beni, not near Santa Cruz. I know that V. cruzianas grow east and south of Santa Cruz, and also far from here at the Brazilian border. One thing that puzzles me about our Victorias is that, even though the first two survivors collected from the wild had reddish rims, the last two seasons plants appeared with light green rims and with stronger red rims than the originals. We have the three colors now as you will see in some of the pictures. The largest leaves are the original reddish ones, although their rims are the shortest. The leaves with green rims are close in size and have the tallest rims. The leaves with tall red rims are only slightly smaller than the green ones."

Comparison of Victoria amazonica and Victoria cruziana to the La Rinconada Victorias Click images to enlarge
Victoria amazonica	La Rinconada	Victoria cruziana
Thorns	No thorns	No thorns
Sepal characteristics appear consistent with V. cruziana
Victoria amazonica	La Rinconada	Victoria cruziana
Petals appear consistent with V. amazonica
Victoria amazonica	La Rinconada	Victoria cruziana
Depth of stigmatic cup appears intermediate
Victoria amazonica	La Rinconada	Victoria cruziana
	Large image | Full size image 339K
Rim colors, heights and slants appear inconsistent with either species