Flowers and foliage April 2008

[Maggi Young]

These asarum are great, Hans! What is the species of no. 2212, the good green one?

[Diane Clement]

Some Asarum. Does anybody know the correct names?

I'll have a go at the Asarum quiz

2205 ?
2209 splendens
2211 delavayi
2212 trigynum?
2215 forbesii
2219 campniforme

Hans could you show the leaves later on?  It may give some extra information.

[Tony Willis]

I agree with Diane apart from trygnium which I have never heard of or seen so cannot comment on. I think these are the names they came with to me from Chen yi who seems to be the source of most of the new ones. I think it should also be campaniforme with an 'a'

[Maggi Young]

see this page in the old Forum for Asarum trigynum album...and some others!
http://www.srgc.org.uk/discus/messages/141/29960.html

[Lesley Cox]

What does epimedium seed look like please? Like that of ranzania or jeffersonia maybe?

[gote]

Ola
Where are you? Maggie wrote something about Sweden.
My Epimediums have not stirred yet - not a single little green thread.
I find them quite difficult to name and many out there are wrongly named.
I could lend you my spare copy of Stearns monograph if you really are in Sweden.
Göte

[Martin Baxendale]

Ola
Where are you? Maggie wrote something about Sweden.
My Epimediums have not stirred yet - not a single little green thread.
I find them quite difficult to name and many out there are wrongly named.
I could lend you my spare copy of Stearns monograph if you really are in Sweden.
Göte

Fishy!

[Maggi Young]

Ola IS in Sweden and was last online earlier this morning, before 8am, so has so far not seen these questions to him..... Martin, you need to sit down and eat some good chocolate, your conspiracy theories are getting the better of you!

[Martin Baxendale]

Ola IS in Sweden and was last online earlier this morning, before 8am, so has so far not seen these questions to him..... Martin, you need to sit down and eat some good chocolate, your conspiracy theories are getting the better of you!

Okay, Maggi, will do (we have some Green & Blacks dark choccy with espresso coffee left over from Easter  ) It's just that when one part of the post was obviously a hoax, it does tend to make one wonder about the rest of the post.  And, as Gote suggests, it seems a bit early for epimedium flowers in Sweden. But if you say so.

[Paul T]

Ola's first post mentioned "Southern Sweden" if that is any help Gote'?

[Ola]

Hi!

Oh yes, I'm really in Sweden and so are the Epimediums. However, the greenhouse effect is not as bad as it may seem... I have many Epimediums in the alpine house since I'm not sure all of them are hardy here. When the plants are big enough I make divisions and try them outside. Lesley, seeds are definitely forming and I'll post a picture of the pods and the seeds later on. Göte, some help with the identification would be welcome and thanks for the Ranzania seeds!
Here's a picture of another Epimedium and also a picture of the collection.





This is how far spring has come in the garden. The plants are all a little weedy, but nice weeds I think.

Chionodoxa.



Chrysoplenium.



Thlaspi.





Martin, are you sure you don't want some of my 'Blue Gal'?

Ola

[Paul T]

Ola,

Was the blue effect added to the Galanthus on the computer, or did you actually paint it?     I'm not sure I could cope with painting a Galanthus blue..... they're so uncommon here it would seem like heresy!! 

By the way.... what is the last pic (entitled "Thlaspi") of?

[Martin Baxendale]

Thanks for the offer, Ola, but I think you'll find the galanthus flowers revert to white next year. 

Paul, the colouring is concentrated in the veins of the flowers so I'd say a blue vegetable-based food dye watered into the pot.

[Paul T]

Martin,

I'd wondered about that myself.  It looks like the dye had been taken up, but I didn't realise that a vegetable dye would be taken up by the plant like that.  I know it can easily be done with cut flowers, but living plants?  Or were the flowers cut, dyed in a vase, then made to look like still growing?

[Martin Baxendale]

Martin,

I'd wondered about that myself.  It looks like the dye had been taken up, but I didn't realise that a vegetable dye would be taken up by the plant like that.  I know it can easily be done with cut flowers, but living plants?  Or were the flowers cut, dyed in a vase, then made to look like still growing?

After posting, I did think that actually it's more likely that the flowers were cut and stood in some bloue dye solution then made to look like they're still in the pot (probably the pot of non-dyed snowdrops placed next to the vase or jar, and the leaves artfully arranged around the cut flowers.

It could work watering dye into a pot, as the dye solution would be taken up by the roots and into the flowers. But I think the giveaway is that the flowers closest to the camera are completely dye-free, so probably still in a pot, with the dyed flowers cut and stood in dye.