The Vico Pink Story: A Breeding Journey
Our original Vico Yellow and Vico Peach plants were acquired from Charl Malan, who sourced them directly from Mr. Yoshi Nakamura during his visit to Japan in 1997. These foundational plants would go on to play a pivotal role in the development of our unique Vico Pink line.
In 2004, we began our focused breeding program by crossing our Vico Yellows with the best Vico Peaches. By 2010, many of the seedlings had flowered, producing an exciting range of soft hues—delicate pinks, rich peaches, and a few yellows. From this diverse pool, we carefully selected only the finest pinky-peach flowers to continue the line.
We named standout selections:
Vico Pink Clouds
Vico Pink Explosion
Vico Pink Parfait
Vico Pink Vogue
Vico Peach Kyla
These sibling plants were then intercrossed, with the goal of refining the pink coloration and improving both flower form and umbel presentation. Most exhibited large, elegant flowers—many with a graceful recurved shape—and well-structured umbels. Notably, the flowers leaned more toward pink than peach.
In this first generation, approximately 25% of the offspring still flowered yellow. However, a remarkable shift occurred in the second generation: by 2015 and 2016, when the next wave of seedlings bloomed, we observed that no yellows were present. This suggests that the pink coloration had stabilized genetically. Even when large yellow plants were introduced as pod or pollen parents (to improve flower shape or count), the progeny still flowered only in shades of pink or peach.
Among the exceptional second-generation seedlings are:
Vico Baby Pink – from Vico Pink Vogue × Vico Pink Parfait
Vico Pink Butterfly
Vico Pink Giant
Vico Pink Sky
Each of these has been selected for continued breeding due to their outstanding colour, flower form, and overall plant quality.
In addition to our miniata work, we have also begun incorporating the Vico Pinks into our interspecific breeding program. Our goal is to develop large, pendulous peach and pink-flowered interspecifics. One promising result is a plant bred by Charl Malan using Vico Peach on a yellow interspecific—demonstrating real potential for future development.
Over the years, we’ve shared many seeds from our Vico Pink and Peach lines with enthusiasts around the world. It is our hope that these will flower as beautifully for others as they have for us—and continue to inspire and expand the palette of pink in Clivia breeding.
