"I'll have to ask them if their friends can possibly follow the story of the little guy." Rocky, I'm pretty sure that their friends were just forwarding the email as well and I doubt if they are the actual folks who found Powder. How do I know this? I was sifting through emails this evening and see a forward from a friend in Arkansas titled: "FW: Albino Fawn". So I thought: WOW! Small World!. But then I noticed very subtle differences in the text... so I decided to research this a bit further and here's what I found out. Apparently this email has been making its rounds since June '05. No matter, it's a great story regardless of when Powder was found and who had found it.

Ateftbed, yes it did bloom and the blooms were not the same as P&C, but were albino. They were the same color as the leaves which are really more of a cream color and not white. Right after it bloomed I cut the top half of the albino stalk off and rooted it. It rooted quickly but was slow to start putting out new leaves. I had some nice baby leaves on it and the cold weather came in so brought it inside and stuck it under a grow light. Apparantly that was a major shock to it because it isn't doing well. But it is still alive and the pot is full of roots. I'm leaving it alone and have decided that if the top doesn't make it, it may come back from the roots in the spring when it goes back outside. Questions for you....did your albino shoot that you cut root normally also? What ended up happening to it? Mine is shrivelling and hollowing out...That only started happening about a week ago. I am so sad about it because it was looking real promising also! I do still have the other half of the albino stalk attached to the mother plant and I'll probably try rooting some of that in the spring. Please post pics of yours!!!

Jackied, love the view you have! Do you have any summer pictures (we have a summer/winter theme that comes up in these threads)?? Must be beautiful with the leaves on the trees. Those yellow berries on the Holly are really pretty. Ellen I have crabapples like that in the back. Most of the fruits have been picked off the wild crabs but not those huge red ones. I wonder if the birds will eat them eventually? I'll have to take a walk this afternoon and try to get some wintry shots. Wasn't it weird to see the ground last week for all of 4 days (for those of us north of the Southern coastline, that is)? After 2 1/2 months of nearly continuous snow cover, and now it's back, seeing the earth come to life is gonna be like heaven...:)

Fruits of the lines like 'Splash of Cream' occasionally produce variegated fruits which are like the kind of striping seen here or on Green Zebra. With these (variegated striping) there is a white layer in addition to the two other forms of green (intensity of chlorophyll but referred to as "clear vs "yellow" skin) on their striped fruit. With these the white layer cannot be noticed once they ripen. It becomes "clear". ***** I think most folks will recognize Splash of Cream better by the name Variegated, or Variegata. It was renamed by someone in France and that was unfortunate, but is listed most places as Variegated. K, I was one of the first to grow Variegated and list it in the SSE Yearbook and while the variegation appears, best in cool weather, on the leaves and stems, I never saw striping on the fruits. When the immature fruits develop there's a darker green wedge shaped pattern of color at the stem end, but no striping, and they do ripen up red. Yes, the striping on Green Zebra is quite prominent as it is with several ofther varieties such as many varieties with Tiger as part of the name. K likes to misspell Opalka, so I won't go there,LOL, but the shape of what's being shown is not a typical roma shape based on the varieties I've grown out; rather I do think it's shape is similar to the many longer apste types I've grown, such as Opalka and Howard German and Sarnowski Polish PLum, etc. And yes, Opalka and many other longer, and even shorter paste types do have nipples at the blossom end and even certain weather conditions can cause the fruits of some other varieties to become slightly heart shaped and even develop nipples which is what I'm sure you're referring to at the end of your post. Carolyn, still waiting for Lazy to hopefully answer some of the questions I asked above. ( smile)