Scottish Rock Garden Club Forum
Plant Identification => Plant Identification Questions and Answers => Topic started by: Susan Band on May 10, 2008, 11:32:45 AM
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Has anybody got an idea what these small muscari/bellevalia? are? They are electric blue, they stand out for miles amongst other things. The photo doesn't do them justice. So far they haven't increased, I can't remember if I got seed in previous years and if I had, the seedlings haven't flowered yet. I have had them for a few years but don't remember where I got them.
Susan
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This is the first flowering of some lost-label bulbs grown from seed.
The closest label says Fritillaria ruthenica from Smolensk, but I plant
my bulb seedlings close together, so I will not assume the seedex
listing was wrong, and I will await the emergence of some Frits eventually.
Meantime, I have a group of cute little white muscari. The flower
stalks are 7 cm high, and each leaf is 10 cm long, and flat along the
ground. The leaves are sharply folded up, completely folded in some cases.
Is there something in particular that I should examine in order to identify them?
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I do hope someone is going to come up with a good answer to this, Diane, because these are ( yet another) section of plants that I find confusing :-[
I have merged Susan's muscari ID question, here, too.
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Can it be Bellevalia forniculata, Susan? At least the color looks the same
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It does look pretty much like my B. forniculata, though judging from the Archibald lists there are several species with that fabulous colour.
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Oleg/Lesley,
It certainly looks the same as B. forniculata. I think I will call it that until someone says otherwise. Olge yours looks as if it is bulking up well, hope mine starts to do this. Thanks.
Susan
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I have had a look at the AGS 'Bulbs of Turkey and Iran' and Ruksans book and I think you are right. Ruksans states that they grow in wet meadows and don't produce offsets so have to be grown from seed. Worth sowing the seed though for their amazing colour.
Thanks for your help.
Susan
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Meantime, I have a group of cute little white muscari. The flower
stalks are 7 cm high, and each leaf is 10 cm long, and flat along the
ground. The leaves are sharply folded up, completely folded in some cases.
Is there something in particular that I should examine in order to identify them?
If it isn't a pure white plant it looks like Muscari pallens - which has a hint of pale blue.
Gerd
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Susan, my B.forniculata really bulks up well. Not that rapidly as some muscari, but at least doubles up yearly producing a lot of seeds. But I have no experience in growing it from seeds as I'm quite happy with vegetative multiplication. The plant may have same clones different in producing offsets. So I was lucky.
Oleg
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For me, Bellevalia forniculata only produces one or two baby offsets each year and they take a couple or 3 years to grow to flowering size. And I only get 2 or 3 seeds per flowering stem, so it's quite slow for me. But having said that, when I first had it about 10 years ago, it bulked up reasonably well and I took off a dozen small groups to pot and sell in flower. Since that disturbance, it has been very slow to increase.
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I've got the little white guy and have had them come in under two names:
Muscari armeniacum 'Album' and Muscari botryoides 'Album'
The Plant Finder has them as:
Muscari armeniacum 'Argaei Album' and M. b. 'Album'
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...oh...LOVE the B. forniculata by the way. Haven't seen that one before...