Scottish Rock Garden Club Forum

Bulbs => Bulbs General => Topic started by: mark smyth on August 03, 2008, 04:47:50 PM

Title: Colchicums late 2008
Post by: mark smyth on August 03, 2008, 04:47:50 PM
Something strange is going on in my garden. I have many Colchicums above ground and flowering already. Looking at last years folder for August 2008 I didnt photograph my Colchicums until the 22nd and 25th. That's 3 weeks early this year.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: dominique on August 04, 2008, 02:31:42 PM
Hi Mark,
I have Colchicum graecum in flower since july 24th, Acis roseum 30th and to morrow Scilla numidica. Colchicum graecum is always the first at home, but very early this year in fact.
Dominique
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: fermi de Sousa on August 11, 2008, 09:29:36 AM
And Colchicum soboliferum (AKA Merendera sobolifera) is about to flower in our rock garden here in the Southern Hemisphere!
cheers
fermi
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on August 13, 2008, 11:17:30 AM
Colchicum cilicium from Pozanti in Turkey
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: dominique on August 14, 2008, 10:19:19 AM
Splendid, Tony. Thanks
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Armin on August 15, 2008, 10:04:16 PM
Tony,
a beautiful wee thing :D
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on August 17, 2008, 04:58:30 PM
Can anyone identify these Colchicums please.

I think the first one comes from Greece, but I have no details for the second - aged label had snapped and important details lost.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Lesley Cox on August 17, 2008, 11:05:14 PM
Is the white one the white form of C. autumnale. Looks just like mine and I don't have anything wildly exciting in that line. Very nice though.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: johnw on August 18, 2008, 02:50:09 AM
Is the white one the white form of C. autumnale. Looks just like mine and I don't have anything wildly exciting in that line. Very nice though.

If it is autumnale would it not be flopping on the ground? Awfully smart looking!

johnw
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Lesley Cox on August 18, 2008, 03:10:19 AM
Why should it be flopping on the ground if the flowers are reasonably freshly opened?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on August 18, 2008, 07:43:30 AM
Tony,
a beautiful wee thing :D

Armin

not so wee, it is actually 7 inches tall.The angle of the photograph gives the impression it is short. I tried to show the inside  of the flower which is very nice.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: johnw on August 18, 2008, 12:19:43 PM
Why should it be flopping on the ground if the flowers are reasonably freshly opened?

All the autumnales flop here - stems horizontal and flowers point up (sometimes). The doubles are just too heavy to stand at all.  Must be our climate. I much prefer C. speciosum.

johnw
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Thomas Huber on August 18, 2008, 03:10:43 PM
After an early start at the end of June with Colchicum parnassicum the next ones are now out:
Colchicum longifolium from Liguria
Colchicum lusitanum
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Luc Gilgemyn on August 18, 2008, 07:21:52 PM
A very promising start Thomas !!!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on August 23, 2008, 11:44:18 AM
a couple more from Greece which are probably just variants of the same species and another view of the cilicicum from Turkey


colchicum sp greece vermion
 cochicum sp greece falackro
 colchicum cilicicum turkey pozanti
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: David Nicholson on August 23, 2008, 08:22:25 PM
Gorgeous little things Tony.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on August 25, 2008, 01:45:03 PM
Who can help? I got Colchicum OKTOBERFEST today. It`s a german name, but I can`t find no german website with it. It`s only listed by RHS. ???
Who likes to swap Colchicum-hybrids?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Luc Gilgemyn on August 25, 2008, 01:53:43 PM
Hagen,
Are you sure 'Oktoberfest' is a bulb...  ??? ::) 8)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on August 25, 2008, 02:01:41 PM
Oh yes Luc. I had two bulbs in my hands. "Oktoberfest" is not only a bavarian trallalla in munich. ;)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: dominique on August 25, 2008, 03:37:13 PM
Hi Hagen
I am interested to swap Hybriden Colchicum. I have already many of them
Dominique
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on August 25, 2008, 07:00:09 PM
Hi Dominique, I will send you a little list of my Cultivars but also of my wishes. Hope we will find something to swap. Please look to www.engelmannii.de. There you can see the most of my colchicums (but not all).
HUXLEY (with butterfly) came last year to me. First season in my garden and blooms in the first flower-period. (Is this the right name for the first group of flowering???)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Maggi Young on August 25, 2008, 07:37:04 PM
Quote
and blooms in the first flower-period. (Is this the right name for the first group of flowering???) 
Hagen, in english we would say the plant " had its first flowering" or "this is the first flowering of this plant"   8)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on August 25, 2008, 08:49:15 PM
Quote
and blooms in the first flower-period. (Is this the right name for the first group of flowering???) 
Hagen, in english we would say the plant " had its first flowering" or "this is the first flowering of this plant"   8)

I wondered if perhaps Hagen has a listing of colchicums which breaks them into groups on the basis of flowering period (early, mid-season, late or something like that). Since so many of the hybrids look alike, flowering period can help in identification.

Bowles, in his account of hybrid colchicums, treats them in this way.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Maggi Young on August 25, 2008, 09:07:08 PM
AHA! Jim, you are most probably correct... I may have grasped the wrong end of this particular stick.... how does Bowles describe these periods? As Hagen suggests? ( no time to look right now!!)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on August 25, 2008, 09:30:57 PM
In the chapter "Garden-Raised Hybrids" of his A Handbook of Crocus and Colchicum for Gardeners, Bowles, after a brief introduction, says "As they have grown in my garden they may be arranged in groups according to colour markings and period of flowering. "

He discusses the richly tessellated forms first, taking them in order of bloom. He does not name groups based on bloom period, but he does group them into a first group to bloom (early August: the cultivars he knew under the names 'Princess Astrid', 'Autumn Queen' and 'Rubens'), a later group of mid-September ('Disraeli', 'Glory of Heemstede', 'Violet Queen') and a "latest to flower group ('Danton', 'Conquest') lasting to the end of September.

He then goes on to discuss the hybrids which are not tessellated, and he groups these according to their appearance (in the sense of what they look like, not appearance in the sense of time of bloom): in this group he does not state bloom times.

Bowles treats 'Huxley' as a variety of Colchicum speciosum. This species and its garden forms are in a different chapter which does not group plants by bloom time, but he does give Colchicum speciosum to early October.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Maggi Young on August 25, 2008, 09:42:35 PM
Jim, many thanks for this info.... :-*
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: David Shaw on August 29, 2008, 06:42:01 PM
Whilst we are are all excited to be back on-line I will try to slip these two pics of Merendera montana through on the Colchicum site.We got them at Discussion W/E a couple of years ago and they appeared to be flowering size corms then but it has taken them until this year to produce the goods. Well worth waiting for, though.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Luc Gilgemyn on August 29, 2008, 06:45:29 PM
They're real beauties David !
Patience well rewarded !!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: David Nicholson on August 29, 2008, 07:38:31 PM
Lovely little things those David.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on August 29, 2008, 08:01:09 PM
David those are very nice,I have never seen them before. What strong colour
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Paul T on August 30, 2008, 12:35:26 AM
David,

That is a lovely dark form.  What I havehere is much paler than that.  Not as rounded petals either.  Very nice!!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on August 30, 2008, 09:13:50 AM
Oh there was a final cut. Without the forum I have fewer fun. Now my world is ok again. Thank you to Maggi and Jim. I meant "first group to bloom". I post TEUFELSKRALLE and Colchicum bornmuellerii once more, also members of the first group.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on August 30, 2008, 09:34:29 AM
Seldom you can see the this intensive glow of pink on Colchicum byzantinum INNOCENCE.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on August 30, 2008, 09:50:56 AM
The most globular flower of a colchicum I ever have seen. Who can help with the name?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on August 30, 2008, 10:39:46 PM
Hagen

I do not know the name of your globular Colchicum.  I am interested to know how many bulbs you planted and how long to achieve the excellent group you now have.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on August 31, 2008, 08:13:36 AM
Good morning Arthur,

2003 I planted 10 bulbs, but now the position is shady. The best time is over.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on August 31, 2008, 08:19:21 AM
Often we have to divide our joy with snails, sadly. Here is GRACIA.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on August 31, 2008, 08:55:07 AM
Colchicum macrophyllum, very big leaves but a delicate and fragile flower.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Luc Gilgemyn on August 31, 2008, 11:33:47 AM
wonderful display Hagen - how tall is Gracia and how big do the leaves grow ??
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Gerdk on August 31, 2008, 01:29:23 PM
Colchicum variegatum from today, I hope the identification is ok (seems too simple)

Gerd
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: WimB on August 31, 2008, 03:53:59 PM
Colchicum autumnale now flowering:
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on August 31, 2008, 04:59:22 PM
Wim, can it be you colchicum is c.cilicicum? How big are the bulbs?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on August 31, 2008, 05:11:00 PM
Not the biggest flower, but the most red in the flower Colchicum cilicicum PURPUREUM. Early this year! Other years two weeks later! What`s happen???
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: WimB on August 31, 2008, 05:24:47 PM
Hello Hagen,

it could be. The bulbs are very big, I don't know the correct measurements but I can find out...

Regards

Wim
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on August 31, 2008, 05:52:11 PM
Wim, if you have verybig bulbs with 12/15 or more flowers, than you can have C. byzantinum. First plants begin to flower here.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Thomas Huber on September 01, 2008, 01:00:30 PM
Hagen you have a great Colchicum collection! Teufelskralle looks particularly well!!

Some more from my garden last week:

- aggripinum and byzantinum Album
- C. autumnale collected on meadows around my hometown
- C. autumnale, white form from Neustadt
- C. cilicicum clump
- C. kochii from Dalmatia
- C. lusitanicum
- C. ? from Greece
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Luc Gilgemyn on September 01, 2008, 01:08:31 PM
Wow - what a display Thomas !!!

From what I can see, you grom them in the rock garden among the Crocus, etc.. , I was wondering, aren't the leaves a nuisance in Spring ???
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Thomas Huber on September 01, 2008, 01:18:29 PM
Luc, in between the Crocus bed are only small leaved forms not more
nuisance than the crocus leaves. The big ones are planted at the edge
of the rockgarden where they don't disturb the natural display.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 01, 2008, 05:28:57 PM
Hey Thomas,

we still loose the summer here im Brandenburg, but you have already found the autumn. Colchicum autumnale will come in two weeks here.It`s early enough. One of the first and tesselated Hybrids is AUTUMN QUEEN.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 01, 2008, 05:40:12 PM
Here are two others,  blooming this time, first period of flowering!
FLAMENCO DANCE
HOLLANDS GLORY or NANCY LINDSAY or C. pannonicum ???
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 01, 2008, 07:53:10 PM
ANTARES, a gem.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 02, 2008, 06:09:29 AM
JAROSLAWNA with an intensive colour.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 02, 2008, 06:33:16 AM
Comes just through the ground colchicum agrippinum.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Armin on September 02, 2008, 08:24:58 AM
Hello Hagen,
wunderful colchicums. I'm just beginning to add some species into my garden.
Is your C. "Teufelskralle" the same as the dutch clone "Harlekijn"?

Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Thomas Huber on September 02, 2008, 10:13:35 AM
Hey Thomas,
we still loose the summer here im Brandenburg, but you have already found the autumn.
Colchicum autumnale will come in two weeks here.It`s early enough.

Hagen, Colchicum autumnale is always among the first Colchicums in my garden and also
in the wild. Will try to make a photo of a great meadow in the next days.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 02, 2008, 08:48:07 PM
Hello Armin,
I found TEUFELSKRALLE a couple of years ago in my own garden. It isn`t HARLEQUIN or JARKA, but it must be the same defect of building good tepales.

Hi Thomas,
my only, but rich of colour C. autumnale, came from hungaria (UNGARNROT). Hope, I can post a fresh picture some weeks later. If you have the early c. autumnale, we should say "Sommerzeitlose" ;) (I have a lot of problems to identify the natural kinds of colchicums, because there is only a few literatur).
All together we have a lot of fun with colchicum, I mean that is important!!!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: I.S. on September 04, 2008, 03:53:02 PM
Hello to every one, and thaks for all these nice shots..
Yesterday I have seen my first flowers of this season. The temperature is around 30 c. and We did not have  any rain here untill now. I have only some cloudes which coming from nord and cooling the weather. I don't know it could be but these plants started to awake up.
Here is a very rare one in my location. I have seen only a few flowers. With the old name of asian part of İstanbul.
C. chalcedonicum ssp. chalcedonicum
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on September 04, 2008, 04:23:28 PM
Welcome back Ibrahim

A very nice Colchicum
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Luc Gilgemyn on September 04, 2008, 04:49:45 PM
A very nice one to start your season with Ibrahim !!!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 04, 2008, 04:59:08 PM
Hi Ibrahim, pictures of seldom shown plants are always better then old cultivares. And you show us such a nice tesselated colchicum ....... Ohhhh
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Armin on September 05, 2008, 08:29:41 AM
Ibrahim,
didn't know this species yet. A lovely one.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: dominique on September 05, 2008, 03:56:03 PM
Hagen you have a great Colchicum collection! Teufelskralle looks particularly well!!

Some more from my garden last week:

- aggripinum and byzantinum Album
- C. autumnale collected on meadows around my hometown
- C. autumnale, white form from Neustadt
- C. cilicicum clump
- C. kochii from Dalmatia
- C. lusitanicum
- C. ? from Greece

Thomas,
your Colchicum cilicicum look better C. laetum with narrow petals to my mind. I like your autumnale album. Mine is more round petals.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: dominique on September 05, 2008, 03:57:47 PM
Hagen,
Thanks for your site. I send you my list of hybrids
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 07, 2008, 12:14:53 PM
Colchicum VIOLET QUEEN , second group of flowering. Two sources two kinds of plants. But what is the right? Who can help?
BOWLES wrote: "Violet Queen also has long pointed segments closely tessellated on a bluish lilac ground contrasting pleasantly with the conspicuously white throat and central channels of the segments".
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 07, 2008, 12:17:40 PM
Colchicum VIOLET QUEEN , the other souce.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 07, 2008, 12:27:10 PM
Colchicum POSEIDON, a "must" for every collection.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 07, 2008, 12:40:03 PM
Early and intensive redpurple colour, Colchicum JOCHEM HOF
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on September 07, 2008, 01:01:49 PM
Hagen

Wonderful Colchicum.  Your garden must be very large, as I find it difficult to fit them in with the large leaves that folow.

They are looking very good in spite of the rain - or have you not suffered the torrential rain that we have had over the last week.  I am fortunate not to be flooded, but I am sure you will have seen on German television the floods in Wales and northern England.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 07, 2008, 01:22:55 PM
Arthur,
yes my garden isn`t small, 2500m². I plant the cultivars of colchicum all in a small area together with grasses (big carex, luzula, calamagrostis brachytricha). The gras is higher than the colchicum leaves and can survival. When the leaves are yellow I pull it out of the ground and clean the soil. Now naked colchicumflowers and grassleaves are a fine couple.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 07, 2008, 09:15:54 PM
Colchicum VIOLET QUEEN , second group of flowering. Two sources two kinds of plants. But what is the right? Who can help?
BOWLES wrote: "Violet Queen also has long pointed segments closely tessellated on a bluish lilac ground contrasting pleasantly with the conspicuously white throat and central channels of the segments".

Hagen, I’m really enjoying these pictures of colchicums.  I'm not sure this will help, but I have long puzzled over the identity of various plants received under the name 'Violet Queen'. The plant I grow as ‘Violet Queen’ is like the one in your images labeled “Violet Queen Dutch”.

I’m inclined to think that this is the true one. I’ve seen two pictures of this from the first half of the twentieth century  in Gartenschönheit: one shows this cultivar alone in an image which is not  clear but which does have the shape of this “Dutch Violet Queen”. The other image is a painting by Esther Bartning of several colchicums: I’ve attached it here for everyone to see.  The plant I grow actually looks more like the one labeled 'Danton' (bottom center)  in this composite picture. In this composite picture 'Violet Queen' is in the second row on the left.

I suspect the caption to this image will not be legible. If anyone would like to see an enlargement of the caption, please let me know.

There is an interesting mistake in this painting: take a look at the white flowers at the lower left in the painting. According to the legend they are identified as  Crocus speciosus ‘Albus’. And they do look more like crocuses than colchicums. But what is wrong about the picture?

Those who would like to see some of the large-flowered colchicums I grow might take a look here:
 
http://www.jimmckenney.com/colchicum_page.htm

The little photo gallery works best in Internet Explorer; in some browsers it displays as an annoying left to right spread which requires a lot of scrolling.

Here is Esther Bartning's painting.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 07, 2008, 10:56:26 PM
Jim

you are a big help. Thank you so much. Bowles told about the picture in GARTENSCHÖNHEIT. I was on the way to search for the book. Now  I know the flowers of the important picture. This VIOLET QUEEN has the deepest colour of all my colchicums. The first time I saw the flowers in the bulbfields of netherland. Asked for the name and a year later I got the bulbs.
Tomorrow I will have  a view to your site. I`m curious.
For your joy, but also for the all other colchicumfans here is Colchicum speciosum ALBUM.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 07, 2008, 11:25:37 PM
This VIOLET QUEEN has the deepest colour of all my colchicums. For your joy, but also for the all other colchicumfans here is Colchicum speciosum ALBUM.

Yes, Hagen, 'Violet Queen' has dark flowers. They darken as they age; fresh, newly open flowers are a much brighter color. As they age they acquire a sort of gray tinge.

Your Colchicum speciosum 'Album' are very lovely. This plant, and typical C. speciosum, are very difficult in my climate: they generally rot during the summer unless kept very dry. But they are worth the trouble.

You seem to be having a very good season this year. Here in Maryland, so far only C. alpinum and the hybrid 'Grazia' are blooming.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: arillady on September 08, 2008, 12:43:12 AM
Jim what a wonderful website you have - I can see myself returning often to see your photo galleries.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on September 08, 2008, 05:27:19 AM
Hagen,

I agree with Jim and also think that true 'Violate Queen' is the one labeled Dutch in your photos.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: olegKon on September 08, 2008, 08:50:03 AM
Hagen,
What wonderful Colchicums you have. Here are some I know the names of already in bloom here
"Dick Trotter"
Colchicum cilicicum?
Colchicun autumnale album
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 08, 2008, 04:03:57 PM
Hello Jim,
today I ordered GARTENSCHÖNHEIT because it`s a historical ducument for us colchicum lovers. Your homepage looks very fine, I will often come back to see.

Thanks Zhirair,
from your pics I learnt much about JAROSLAVNA. But the small colchicum is too small for my garden.

Hi Oleg,
your DICK TROTTER is also a very special plant. I would mean, the second pic is C. speciosum atrorubens??? C cilicicum isn`t so big. Have a look to my pic some posts earlier. Or look here:http://www.garten-in-den-wiesen.de/bilder/colchicum/index.htm (http://www.garten-in-den-wiesen.de/bilder/colchicum/index.htm)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 09, 2008, 02:25:18 PM
Jim,
if nobody want to solve your riddle, I will at least give a short tip. ;) Anthers ???
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 09, 2008, 02:50:00 PM
Jim,
if nobody want to solve your riddle, I will at least give a short tip. ;) Anthers ???

That's it!

Hagen, your eyes are evidently sharper than those of the editor in charge back then.

Does everyone see what we are talking about?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Maggi Young on September 09, 2008, 03:04:01 PM
Jim,
if nobody want to solve your riddle, I will at least give a short tip. ;) Anthers ???

That's it!

Hagen, your eyes are evidently sharper than those of the editor in charge back then.

Does everyone see what we are talking about?

See this post on previous page: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
« Reply #69 on: September 07, 2008, 09:15:54 PM »  .... for picture.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Martin Baxendale on September 09, 2008, 03:37:54 PM
Thanks Maggi. I missed Jim's little challenge. Too many anthers for a crocus - six like a colchicum instead of three.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 09, 2008, 04:19:54 PM
Thanks Maggi. I missed Jim's little challenge. Too many anthers for a crocus - six like a colchicum instead of three.

That's it, Martin!

I didn't expect anyone on this forum to be fooled by that one!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 09, 2008, 04:43:29 PM
Jim
I hope the flowers of the picture are correct. That is the real important question. Were we can find the first mistake may be there are some others??? ;)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 09, 2008, 05:27:27 PM
Jim
I hope the flowers of the picture are correct. That is the real important question. Were we can find the first mistake may be there are some others??? ;)

Well, Hagen, now that you mention it...

The flower in the upper right of the Bartning painting is named 'The Giant'. I grow a colchicum in my garden which agrees very well with this image.

However, Bowles places 'The Giant' among the forms with very slight tessellation. He wrote "The second group evidently resembles the plain lilac parent more than the chequered one in the greater size of the long firm tube, the taller and smoother segments of the tulip-shaped flowers, and also very slight tessellation which shows mostly on the inner surface."

The plant I grow as 'The Giant' has the largest flowers of any colchicum I have ever seen: when fully open, one might place an orange comfortably in the cup of the flower. The flower is also well tessellated. To be sure, because of its paler color the tessellation is not as vivid as in some forms; but it is there, on the inside and the outside of the entire tepal, and under the right lighting conditions it is very conspicuous. One would not describe this degree of tessellation as showing "mostly on the inner surface".

So I'm left wondering which to believe, the description by Bowles or the painting by Bartning.

Even in the time of Bowles the identity of the Zocher hybrids seems to have been somewhat confused.

I've attached an image of this uncertain 'The Giant'.

For years I grew a variety of plants under the name 'Disraeli'. What I now believe to be the true plant has been in my garden only for a few years. It came from an  ultimage source I would be very reluctant to challenge. It is one of my favorites, and I've attached an image from past years (it is not yet in bloom this year here).


Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 09, 2008, 05:46:52 PM
Now that I've seen that image of 'The Giant' on-line, I think I should post another one to show the tessellation.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 09, 2008, 06:03:34 PM
Jim
I hope the flowers of the picture are correct. That is the real important question. Were we can find the first mistake may be there are some others??? ;)

Hagen, here's another possibility: perhaps it was a colchicum which Bartning painted. Some members of the genus, for instance some cultivars of  Colchicum szovitsii, look a bit like the image in the painting said to be Crocus speciosus albus in the caption.

Perhaps some of the real colchicum experts will weigh in on this one.

My apologies if this gets posted twice: the first time seemed to fail.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: hadacekf on September 09, 2008, 07:25:46 PM
Here are a few pics of my present flowering colchicum.
All colchicum come from the Mediterranean area. No cultivars!
Only C.agrippinum was bought.

Colchicum-agrippinum.jpg
Colchicum-sibthorpii.jpg  - Olympos
\Colchicum-cilicicum.jpg  - Turkey
Colchicum-bivonae.jpg - Italy
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: ranunculus on September 09, 2008, 07:44:13 PM
Magnificent Franz ... many thanks.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 09, 2008, 07:48:04 PM
Yes, really exciting Franz. The variation in Colchicum bivonae is very interesting.
It must be a real pleasure to step out into the garden and see such plants.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on September 10, 2008, 05:42:19 AM
Jim,

I think your colchicum 'The Giant' is true to name. I grow it as well, mine look the same as yours, and, no doubt, the cultivar has light tessalation.

I did think that colchicum 'The Giant' is the largest among all colchicums, until colchicum giganteum appeared in my collection. It astonished me by its huge sizes.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 10, 2008, 06:34:00 AM
Oh Franz,
your Colchicum bivonae look very fine and there is a lot of difference to other species and cultivars. You show us the great variation of wild colchicum already in one species. Glad to see your pics.

For some more confusion (or not) here are ATTLEE and AUTUM HERALD. I`m searching for the differences.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Luc Gilgemyn on September 10, 2008, 08:38:24 AM
Franz,

You never stop to amaze us...

All are wonderful but C. bivonae 3 is my favourite.

Thanks for sharing these wonders
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: olegKon on September 10, 2008, 12:21:40 PM
Hello Jim,
today I ordered GARTENSCHÖNHEIT because it`s a historical ducument for us colchicum lovers. Your homepage looks very fine, I will often come back to see.

Thanks Zhirair,
from your pics I learnt much about JAROSLAVNA. But the small colchicum is too small for my garden.

Hi Oleg,
your DICK TROTTER is also a very special plant. I would mean, the second pic is C. speciosum atrorubens??? C cilicicum isn`t so big. Have a look to my pic some posts earlier. Or look here:http://www.garten-in-den-wiesen.de/bilder/colchicum/index.htm (http://www.garten-in-den-wiesen.de/bilder/colchicum/index.htm)
Hagen,
Thanks for the ID. This is really like your "Atrorubens' does yours have a greenish or purplish "stem"?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 10, 2008, 01:29:34 PM
Oleg
the stems but also the color of the flowers often darken. C. spec. Atrorubrum isn`t out of the ground this year. I will have a look at it. Because we haven`t the same source for our bulbs there must be differences. Look to a natural ground for colchicum. You can find allways flowers with differences in color. The result: we have to show a genealogical tree for our cultivares >:(
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 10, 2008, 02:22:47 PM
Jim,

I think your colchicum 'The Giant' is true to name. I grow it as well, mine look the same as yours, and, no doubt, the cultivar has light tessalation.

I did think that colchicum 'The Giant' is the largest among all colchicums, until colchicum giganteum appeared in my collection. It astonished me by its huge sizes.

Zhirair, that's good news to me: I have a small plant of Colchicum giganteum here. It bloomed once, but the flower was not exceptionally large. It has not bloomed during the last two years. Perhaps the day will come when I'll see the really big flowers.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Michael J Campbell on September 10, 2008, 10:04:25 PM
Colchicum cupanii
The first one to flower for me this year, nothing in the garden yet.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: ashley on September 11, 2008, 10:25:56 AM
Beautiful plant Michael, and a great picture.  Do you grow it under cover all year?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on September 11, 2008, 01:09:48 PM
Jim,

This is my colchicum giganteum, photographed in fall 2007.
You can see the way it looks in my garden.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Thomas Huber on September 11, 2008, 01:40:30 PM
Different Colchicums in my rockgarden:
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 11, 2008, 02:03:00 PM
Fine and globular, your C. giganteum Zhirair. I like these form.

Thomas, it looks a little bit prussian. There is some strictly arrangement in. Healthy plants 8)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Lvandelft on September 11, 2008, 04:42:19 PM
Different Colchicums in my rockgarden:

Where did I see this (almost the same) picture ? ;)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Maggi Young on September 11, 2008, 04:59:15 PM
 ;D ;D ;D

.....for those of you puzzled, try here: http://www.srgc.org.uk/smf/index.php?topic=2435.msg55186;boardseen#new

...super to see the change in a short time!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: mark smyth on September 11, 2008, 05:04:49 PM
If only my Colchicums would stand so proud! The £$%^&*( rain and wind nearly always beats them down
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: mark smyth on September 11, 2008, 06:17:43 PM
I've mentioned elsewhere in the forums that the white Colchicum kessellringii that came in a batch of kessellringiis has deteriorated to mush and has maggots eating it. The question has to be did it die due to our very wet summer or because of the maggots
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: mark smyth on September 11, 2008, 06:24:58 PM
Is byzantinum the only Colchicum with a purple style?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: David Nicholson on September 11, 2008, 06:42:49 PM
Different Colchicums in my rockgarden:



Looks great Thomas.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Michael J Campbell on September 11, 2008, 07:58:02 PM
[Beautiful plant Michael, and a great picture.  Do you grow it under cover all year?]

Ashley, It is under cover all year.
Re. the picture,just playing around and trying to get used to my new camera. Had builders in for two months, then I got a dose of Shingles and have just about recovered,so I am only getting to use the camera now.

Cheers Michael.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Maggi Young on September 11, 2008, 08:02:27 PM
Oh, my goodness, Michael... builders AND shingles... :o ...... I wonder you are fit to take any photos at all... your new camera looks to be giving great results though, eh?  8)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Michael J Campbell on September 11, 2008, 08:20:57 PM
It would Maggi, If I knew how to use it properly.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Michael J Campbell on September 11, 2008, 08:26:04 PM
Maggi, the Electricity Supply Board have been in my front garden all week removing an underground transformer.I am afraid to look at the damage they have caused, not quite up to repairing it yet. Had no power all day Tuesday.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Maggi Young on September 11, 2008, 09:23:54 PM
Even more sympathy, Michael....we are having computer problems of various sorts and this evening the electricity is spiking and the phones are funny....everything seems to be going skew-wiff!  :-X :-\ :'(

I would send you some chocolate to cheer you up, but I recall you do not eat the stuff...I'll just send a consoling cuddle, then! ;)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: David Nicholson on September 11, 2008, 09:33:26 PM
Michael, your last few pictures have really been first class. I'm sure you have the hang of the new camera now.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Thomas Huber on September 12, 2008, 07:43:53 AM
Different Colchicums in my rockgarden:

Where did I see this (almost the same) picture ? ;)

Just one week between the two photos!!!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 13, 2008, 12:24:18 PM
Colchicum BEACONSFIELD, easy to differ from others by U-profile of the segments and the starry Y of the flower.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on September 14, 2008, 01:10:56 PM
I saw a nice field of C. autumnale last Thursday in the Ardenne. They were very variable in colour including some white and some with very finely variegated flowers.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on September 14, 2008, 02:31:13 PM
Some in flower when we got back home
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Armin on September 14, 2008, 04:27:42 PM
Wow - no C. autumnale open here in meadows yet.
Like your tesselated colchicums, Tony.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: I.S. on September 14, 2008, 06:24:37 PM
Tony very nice colchicums.
The last one is the best for me. Just I want to be sure If I am not wrong C. variegatum is from Fethiye S.W. TR.  and C. bivonae from Edremit. N.W. TR.!!!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on September 14, 2008, 07:53:05 PM
ibrahim

I think both are in SW Turkey as Edrimit is about 100 miles North of Izmir.I always think of NW Turkey as being in the Istanbul area
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: I.S. on September 14, 2008, 10:36:27 PM
Tony,
C. bivonae is not recorded in Fethiye ( for this species I have record in Edremit )
C. variegatum is not recorded in Edremit ( for this species I  have record in Fethiye )
I just want to help by locations.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on September 14, 2008, 10:39:12 PM
In today's sunshine, Cc. atticum; cupanii and pusillum opened in the bulb house. The sun had gone by the time I got the camera out. Note the thin leaves of pusillum when compared with the large supervolute leaves of cupanii.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: arillady on September 15, 2008, 01:30:32 AM
I sure hope seeds of some of these Colchicum species make their way to the SRGS seedlist.
Such beauties.
Warm regards,
Pat T
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Luc Gilgemyn on September 15, 2008, 08:08:28 AM
Beautiful pix Anthony !
I'll be putting C. cupanii on my wants list !
Would it do well outdoors ??
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Thomas Huber on September 15, 2008, 08:16:31 AM
Beautiful pix Anthony !
I'll be putting C. cupanii on my wants list !
Would it do well outdoors ??
Luc, mine are outside in their third year and still do well!

Pat, in the last years I always had seeds of cupanii, pusillum and psaridis to spare. Please remind me next summer (June/July)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: mark smyth on September 15, 2008, 08:16:51 AM
I grow it outside and it's OK but at this time I must put down slug pellets.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Luc Gilgemyn on September 15, 2008, 08:52:50 AM
Thanks Thomas an Mark !  ;)  Good advice is always welcome.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on September 15, 2008, 09:02:14 AM
Beautiful pix Anthony !
I'll be putting C. cupanii on my wants list !
Would it do well outdoors ??
I tried it outside here in Dunblane. Never saw it again. I don't think it is a bog plant? :-\
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on September 15, 2008, 10:16:24 AM
Tony,
C. bivonae is not recorded in Fethiye ( for this species I have record in Edremit )
C. variegatum is not recorded in Edremit ( for this species I  have record in Fethiye )
I just want to help by locations.

ibrahim  you are quite correct.I have labelled the origin of the bulbs in the photographs the wrong way around when putting them on my pc. My apologies and it will teach me to write notes and not depend on what is left of an ageing brain when taking photographs.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 15, 2008, 08:02:18 PM
Edremit is the best place to find C. bivonae in turkey? I want to go swimming but also looking for some flovers?!?!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on September 15, 2008, 08:59:42 PM
In late October the whole SW coast is good for flowers with masses of cyclamen just inland together with crocus, biarum, galanthus and colchicum in different areas. This reminds me only four weeks to wait. I do not bother with the swimming. Not C. bivonae but still nice to see,
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 15, 2008, 09:14:17 PM
I will thinking about swimming. Looking for flowers is much better.  ;)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: arillady on September 17, 2008, 12:22:18 AM
Tony did that clump of Colchicums naturally occur in that rock pocket like that?? Stunning.
Thomas I will have to buy a diary for next year to put a reminder in it to ask about seed. Have never investigated how to do this on my laptop.
Pat
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on September 17, 2008, 09:42:15 AM
Pat

yes it did. The rock is limestone and full of holes. These are filled with the colchicum,usually on its own or cyclamen graecum and galanthus peshmenii either individually or together. I would add that the edges of the rocks are razor sharp and quite unpleasant to clamber about on.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on September 17, 2008, 11:51:18 AM
Was not sure where to post this.

I knocked out a pot of ? Colchicum to either re-pot or plant in the garden.  No longer sure that it is a Colchicum, but also no idea what it might be.

Could someone please help me identify this plant.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on September 17, 2008, 12:20:09 PM
It looks like an asarum tuber.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on September 17, 2008, 03:11:32 PM
Hermodactylus tuberosus  look like that too, but I do have some colchicums that have tubers, rather than bulbs, not too dissimilar to these.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Thomas Huber on September 17, 2008, 03:15:55 PM
Especially as a reminder for Pat - Colchicum pusillum:
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on September 17, 2008, 03:18:18 PM
Anthony - you could win the prize.  I have never had Asarums, but I have had Hermodactylus.  Will watch as it grows.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 17, 2008, 03:34:56 PM
Hermodactylus tuberosus  look like that too, but I do have some colchicums that have tubers, rather than bulbs, not too dissimilar to these.

Anthony, I think colchicums grow from corms (a storage organ formed mostly from stem tissue), not bulbs (a storage organ with a core of stem tissue surrounded by modified leaves which serve as the primary storage structures).

And I've seen some of the ones with long, sausage-like corms which move horizontally in the style of rhizomes (rhizomatous corms anyone?). Those of Colchicum soboliferum are a good example.

Have you ever noticed the resemblance between these long colchicum corms and the corms of the tropical climbing lilies of the genus Gloriosa? In modern arrangements, both Colchicum and Gloriosa are placed in the family Colchicaceae.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: arillady on September 18, 2008, 10:11:31 AM
Thanks Thomas for posting the photos of Colchicum pusillum. So white and perfect.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Thomas Huber on September 18, 2008, 01:30:33 PM
My pleasure Pat!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on September 18, 2008, 03:25:58 PM
Thanks Jim for the clarification. Sometimes I find it difficult to work out whether something is a corm, a rhizome, a bulb or a tuber.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Oron Peri on September 19, 2008, 05:06:44 PM
Just came back yesterday from Chios - Greece where Colchicum variegatum is in flower from sea level up to 600m. Almost always around Pine trees.
Flowers on mature plants can reach 12cm in diameter, usually 5-10cm
Only one to two flowers on each bulb.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 19, 2008, 05:17:07 PM

Very nice, Oron.

Colchicum variegatum
is blooming today here in USDA zone 7 Maryland, USA.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: David Nicholson on September 19, 2008, 07:18:25 PM
Lovely Oron.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 19, 2008, 07:48:25 PM
Colchicum variegatum today in East Germany. No sun no nice pictures.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 19, 2008, 08:10:18 PM
Jim, not 3 and not 6 anthers. Nevertheless it`s a colchicum. Colchicum macrophyllum
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Oron Peri on September 19, 2008, 08:19:29 PM
Hagen
lovely C. macrophyllum, does the two species set seeds in your climate?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 19, 2008, 08:40:18 PM
No, Oron, I haven`t seen ever seed(capsule) on my plants. But the leaves aren`t too big and the flowers suggest a spring in autumn time.
We await the winter here next time (from december and later).
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 19, 2008, 11:11:18 PM
Jim, not 3 and not 6 anthers. Nevertheless it`s a colchicum. Colchicum macrophyllum

Very nice, Hagen. I don't grow Colchicum macrophyllum yet.

Maybe we should have a new genus for your plant:  how about Crochicum or Colchiocus?  :) ::)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 19, 2008, 11:50:51 PM
Thanks Jim for the clarification. Sometimes I find it difficult to work out whether something is a corm, a rhizome, a bulb or a tuber.


So do I, Anthony! One reason I made that post was to revive the ongoing discussion of what these terms mean. I'm anticipating some vigorous, contrasting points of view -   and, I hope, some merry repartee to go with it.  ;)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: ranunculus on September 20, 2008, 08:09:51 AM
Hi Jim,
As an experiment I tried entering your four words, of intrigue and mystery, into Wikipedia and the results are quite illuminating!  How much we can trust this information is open to debate but it appears to be an excellent starting point ... ?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Otto Fauser on September 20, 2008, 08:25:48 AM
I sure hope seeds of some of these Colchicum species make their way to the SRGS seedlist.
Such beauties.
Warm regards,
Pat T
[/Pat, I have clumps of Colchicum pusillum in my garden , so I'm only too happy to send you some in summer,
   ciao Otto.quote]
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: arillady on September 20, 2008, 08:45:10 AM
Thanks Otto that will be great.
Pat
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on September 22, 2008, 07:51:33 AM
Hagen,

Would you, please, post a photo of your colchicum 'Zephyr' and describe its main features, by which it is distinguished from other varieties. I cannot enlarge its picture in your website.

It is blooming for me the first year, but I think it could be mislabeled, as it has very ordinary appearnace, resembling unhybridised colchicum speciosum. It's heart desn't look star-shaped.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 22, 2008, 02:33:57 PM
Hi Zhirair,
I had a problem to send an e-mail to you this morning. Your adress is ok?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: dominique on September 22, 2008, 04:29:34 PM
I have put off my informatic problems. It is time to send you pics of my colchicum garden

 Colchicum alpinum.jpg
 Colchicum bivonae Apollo 1.jpg
 Colchicum bivonae Apollo 2.jpg
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: dominique on September 22, 2008, 04:32:59 PM
more
Colchicum bornmuellerii,Zephyr and speciosum Ordu.jpg
 Colchicum byzantinum Album 2.jpg
 Colchicum byzantinum Album 3bmp.jpg
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: dominique on September 22, 2008, 04:35:38 PM
more
Colchicum byzantinum Album.jpg
 Colchicum byzantinum bmp.jpg
 Colchicum corsicum.jpg
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: dominique on September 22, 2008, 04:37:28 PM
more always

Colchicum cretense.jpg
 colchicum garden.jpg
 Colchicum kotschyi.jpg

Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: dominique on September 22, 2008, 04:39:03 PM
more
Colchicum macrophyllum 2.jpg
 Colchicum macrophyllum.jpg
 colchicum pannonicum.jpg
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Luc Gilgemyn on September 22, 2008, 04:40:10 PM
 :o :o :o :o :o

What a tremendous show Dominique !!!!

My favourite is C. alpinum - what a neat little gem that is !

But the masses of the others are phenomenal !
What on earth do you do with the leaves in Spring ???
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: dominique on September 22, 2008, 04:40:22 PM
more
 Colchicum Poseidon.jpg
 Colchicum Rosy Queen.jpg
 Colchicum sibthorpii 2.jpg
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: dominique on September 22, 2008, 04:41:57 PM
more

Colchicum sibthorpii.jpg
 Colchicum speciosum Ordu.jpg
 Colchicum speciosum x Zephyr.jpg

Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: dominique on September 22, 2008, 04:44:21 PM
the end. I hope you have pleasure

Colchicum troodii after rain.jpg
 Merendera attica.jpg
 Zephyr, Ordu and bornmuelleri'(right).
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on September 22, 2008, 05:01:19 PM
Dominique

Thank you for the cornucopia of colchicum.

Like Luc, I would like to know wat you do with the leaves in Spring.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Carlo on September 22, 2008, 05:06:35 PM
I've got a lovely combination (it worked! it worked!) of C. 'Waterlily' and C. 'The Giant' with Gentiana makinoi 'Royal Blue' blooming right now. I had hoped the gentian would match the colchicum's season of interest, and...voila!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on September 22, 2008, 05:12:05 PM
Carlo

Did you intend to share your delight with us with a photograph?  :)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: mark smyth on September 22, 2008, 05:19:58 PM
Dominique one word WOW!  :o Is byzantinum Album single bulbs? Mine dont flower like that
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Carlo on September 22, 2008, 05:23:08 PM
Aha...

It's not photographed yet...and I have a tendency to get great photographs and never take the time to put them through my work flow so that they can be put up on the web, printed, etc.

I've got my work cut out...
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: hadacekf on September 22, 2008, 05:40:32 PM
Dominique you have an extensive beautiful collection. My congratulation.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on September 22, 2008, 05:45:32 PM
Dominique one word WOW!  :o Is byzantinum Album single bulbs? Mine dont flower like that

Mark

I recently bought 3 bulbs and the first one has already thrown up 3 flowers with the promise of more.  :)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 22, 2008, 06:36:07 PM
Dominique, fantastic colchicum. Only in the formery CSSR I have ever seen such a fine colchicumncollection.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 22, 2008, 07:36:05 PM
Hi Zhirair,

here is ZEPHYR. It`s not a winner. You are full right, only a moderate Colchicum without a good color or size. I don`t need it. It`s not as good as AUTUMN HERALD or ATTLEE. Between two colchicum souls I would say: forget it. But actually Dominique shows us his fantastic collection.

Dominique, how do you think about Zephyr, also bad like me?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 22, 2008, 09:39:53 PM

I found TEUFELSKRALLE a couple of years ago in my own garden. It isn`t HARLEQUIN or JARKA, but it must be the same defect of building good tepales.


Hagen, when you named Colchicum 'Teufelskralle', did you do so because it reminded you of Physoplexis comosa (aka Phyteuma comosum )?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on September 23, 2008, 05:41:58 AM
Hagen,

my e-mail address mentioned in this website is not always working properly. For sending correspondence it is better to send to the same address writing inbox.ru instedad of freenet.am.

Thanks a lot for showing the photo of 'Zhepyr'. I see your have somewhat starry shaped base. But I think mine are somewhat similar to Dominique's. I photographed my 'Zephyr' and will try to post the pcs soon. yes, you're right, this variety has nothing special. I just took an interest as in its description was written that it has large globular flowers.

Dominique, tremendous show of colchicums!!!!!!!! I am highly impressed! great.
Colchicum byzantinum is an abundant bloomer and in masses it makes a fantastic display. The only fauls are: weeker tubes and slow increasing.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 23, 2008, 06:23:26 AM
Morning Jim, yes I thought to Phyteuma`s German name, but it looks more like the fingernail of devil`s wife. ;)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on September 23, 2008, 11:59:52 AM
Interesting - everybody post their nice photos of colchicum and I see nobody grows one og the nicest forms - colchicum speciosum Atrorubens.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: mark smyth on September 23, 2008, 12:44:27 PM
I used to have C. atrorubens. It could be one of my unidentified Colchicums. I'll post photos later
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Rafa on September 23, 2008, 02:34:37 PM
Hello friends,

This is Colchicum cupanii var. glossophyllum, Colchicum is another of my favourite genus, although I don't grow many species....
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on September 23, 2008, 02:46:27 PM
Rafa

 ;D
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on September 23, 2008, 04:27:36 PM
Gosh, some lovely colchicums. 8) Here are some more of mine flowering at the weekend. One labelled 'cupanii', but unlike Rafa's and my other two, the leaves are narrow and applanate. The other two are labelled as Colchicum pusilum Crete, but don't look the same to me.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 23, 2008, 06:07:35 PM
Oh yes Anthony, that is the witch`s spell of the genus colchicum. You have different plants with the same name and I have same plants with different names. ;D
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: David Shaw on September 23, 2008, 06:59:08 PM
Whilst were away the Colchicum cupanii were busy doing their thing.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on September 23, 2008, 07:08:53 PM
That's a nice potfull David. :) I'm trying to find out the difference between pusillum and cretense. The only thing I can find is cretense has brown anthers, as opposed to yellow, and flowers before the leaves in Crete [- this may not be the case in the alpine house?]. Both seem to have tepals up to 2cm long. I have a pot labelled cretense, but nothing so far this year. I suspect my first pic above is not cupanii but not knowing from whence it came makes it difficult to identify.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 23, 2008, 08:27:32 PM
Hi Zhirair, I have made a pic from the only bulb of Colchicum speciosum Atrorubens, I have. I hope it is correct. The color is much better then the pic, it`s a lot more purplered. I had the corm several years but it is not a good splitter.
An equal good cultivar is ROSY DAWN, you can find it out in every collection.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: mark smyth on September 23, 2008, 10:29:01 PM
Anthony, David's potful is the same as my cupanii flowering with well advanced supervolute leaves
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: olegKon on September 24, 2008, 12:49:22 PM
Luckily the weather is dry and sunny.
Colhicum agrippinum

Colhicum autumnale
Colchicum Water Lily
Colchicum Glory of Hempsted (is it?)
Colhicum tenorii
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on September 24, 2008, 01:06:19 PM
Hagen,

It's true. Colchicum speciosum Atrorunens is quite bad increaser. Bisides, I noticed, that it blooms quite later than the other speciosum variations. I got a single bulb of it from a colleague from Moscow 3 years ago and still have only one bulb. I still wait  to see when it'll decide to produe a generation.

In my garden doesn't show as dark stems as in the garden of my colleague and which is a pazzle for me. Maybe the reason is semi-shade.

I post a its picture from my Moscow colleague.
I very much like the way it looks.
The variety 'Rosy Dawn' came into my collection only this year and I've been waiting for it's blooming. Additinally, I can recommend the variety 'Pink Goblet', which has very nice rounded goblets, resembling in shape col chicum specious Album.

Ole,

Wonderful photos, especially the pics of c. autumnale and tenor ii! Col chicum tenor ii looks wonderful and impressive.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Armin on September 24, 2008, 01:13:50 PM
Dominique,
I'm overwhelmed with joy by your colchicum flower show 8) 8) 8)
Your garden pictures are contagious. It seems I get another infection ;D

To all others,
thank you for showing all such colchicum beauties :)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on September 24, 2008, 01:19:08 PM
By the way, what I wanted to ask.
In a Russian on-line horticultural encyclopedia it is mentioned that there are 2 dark blooming variations of colchicum speciosum - one is colchicum speciosum rubrum, the other is colchicum speciosum Atrorunens. It is said that colchicum speciosum rubrum is slightly paler than Atrorubens. Anyway, the variation rubrum sounds unfamiliar to me and I can't find any information about it in Western literature. I'd like to know if anybody of you heard about it.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on September 24, 2008, 04:30:15 PM
Boyed

I have just been given one called C. speciosum Beckets' Darkest, to be a little sarcastic, presumably the darkest in his garden at that moment.So if this is not mentioned it makes three!!

here are two C bivonae the first of which is flowering for the first time and I am very pleased with it  and a species from Nur Dag in Turkey
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Luc Gilgemyn on September 24, 2008, 04:37:46 PM
Great pix Tony !
The species from Turkey is a real gem !!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 24, 2008, 09:27:12 PM
Hi Zhirair,

Patrick M Synge COLLINS GIDE TO BULBS (London 1961) describes the cultivar ATRORUBENS and refers a species too, called Colchicum rubrum.
Rod Leeds AUTUMN BULBS (2005) also describes both, ATRORUBENS and RUBRUM.

Between ATRORUBENS an ATROPURPUREUM there are a mass of misunderstandings.
I got all my ATRORUBENS as ATROPURPUREUM.

Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: dominique on September 24, 2008, 10:34:30 PM
Thank you Armin. I will be able to swap with you a lot of varieties next year if you want be ill with rosy desease !!! for all asked me what i make with the leaves : In spring, there is daffodils, tulips and Allium  in the areas beetween the Colchicum.Leaves are large but not bad, only 2  weeks in june yellow before dry. The ground is grey in summer but in august it is the explosion married with Dahlia and Aster. It is a choice. We cannot have such flowers without the leaves after.
Colchicum autumnale atropurpureum is a little very dark form of autumnale but atrorubens is a speciosum. I have speciosum Dick Trotter and speciosum Maximum very dark too
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 24, 2008, 10:35:19 PM
Hi Zhirair,

Patrick M Synge COLLINS GIDE TO BULBS (London 1961) describes the cultivar ATRORUBENS and refers a species too, called Colchicum rubrum.
Rod Leeds AUTUMN BULBS (2005) also describes both, ATRORUBENS and RUBRUM.

Between ATRORUBENS an ATROPURPUREUM there are a mass of misunderstandings.
I got all my ATRORUBENS as ATROPURPUREUM.



Hagen, take another look at Synge. There is a comma after the word sp. : "  'Atrorubens'...a very fine variety of the sp., rubrum is very close to this..."

I think what he was saying amounts to this: "  'Atrorubens'... a very fine variety of the species speciosum, [the variety, garden form, hybrid] rubrum is very close to this..."

Notice that Synge had the word rubrum printed in italics (durch schrägen Druck ). This is typical of practice at that time; note that he also used it for album as in Colchicum speciosum album. But the white flowered Colchicum speciosum is a clone, isn't it? And in any case there is no naturally existing population of white flowered Colchicum speciosum that I'm aware of. In a modern text the names would be written Colchicum speciosum 'Album' and Colchicum speciosum 'Rubrum' (at least by those who regard 'Rubrum' as a form of C. speciosum).
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 25, 2008, 06:32:07 AM
Good morning Dominique,

yes we should help the new fans of colchicum, because the plants are more better then their reputation. Do you have some pics of D TROTTER and C s MAXIMUM.

Hello Jim, here I have only a german translation of P M Synge. So you have the original and know it better.

*"ATRORUBENS" lebhaft purpur-karmesinrot ohne Würfelzeichnung, eine sehr ansprechende Varietät, die der Species C. rubrum sehr nahe kommt, aber etwas hellere Blüten hat.

You are right, rubrum is another cultivar, like album.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on September 25, 2008, 06:57:52 AM
some pics of colchicum from my garden

colchicum Neptun - large-flowered and tall variety with pointed petals, equally good as 'Posaidon'

colchicum 'Posaidon'
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on September 25, 2008, 07:01:16 AM
colchicum speciosum Album - best of the bests
colchicum 'Lilac Wonder' - very floriferous and elegant
colchicum 'Larisa Dolina' - lily-shaped flowers, named after famous Russian pop singer
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on September 25, 2008, 07:05:01 AM
colchicum byzantinum - very floriferous, but has weaker tubes and is slow increaser
colchicum 'Violate Queen'
colchicum 'Zephyr' ?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: BULBISSIME on September 25, 2008, 07:48:18 AM
Here is Colchicum pusillum, the tiny species from crete.

(http://i14.servimg.com/u/f14/11/84/35/03/img_7110.jpg) (http://www.servimg.com/image_preview.php?i=281&u=11843503)

and Colchicum autumnale var. album plenum

(http://i14.servimg.com/u/f14/11/84/35/03/img_7111.jpg) (http://www.servimg.com/image_preview.php?i=282&u=11843503)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hans A. on September 25, 2008, 08:50:43 AM
Thanks to all for these wonderful pictures - hope to contribute also some pics a bit later, as just yesterday I found the first sign of growth in the garden ... :D
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 25, 2008, 01:26:18 PM

Hello Jim, here I have only a german translation of P M Synge. So you have the original and know it better.

*"ATRORUBENS" lebhaft purpur-karmesinrot ohne Würfelzeichnung, eine sehr ansprechende Varietät, die der Species C. rubrum sehr nahe kommt, aber etwas hellere Blüten hat.

You are right, rubrum is another cultivar, like album.


Thanks, Hagen, you've added a word to my German vocabulary: die Würfelzeichnung - so that's what tessellation is called in German!  :)

Yes, I think the translation of Synge is incorrect.

I noticed something else in the translated passage you quoted: the use of the word die Species. I'm used to seeing the word die Art, and  since this seems to be used in German for both species and cultivar, I've often wondered how Germans understand which is meant. Does one rely on context?

Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: mark smyth on September 25, 2008, 02:03:46 PM
Zhirair my 'Larisa Dolina' is much taller that yours
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 25, 2008, 07:43:15 PM
My too, Zhirair. Neptun will flower next days. Poseidon is over. Do you know where these cultivares come from?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 25, 2008, 08:18:56 PM
Good evening Jim, there is some confusion in the translation of Synge. The cultivar ATRORUBENS is written great (it`s not a hybrid) but RUBRUM is written small, like a  german Art. We often say species or Art, it`s the same. Sorte is the cultivar (hybrid or not isn`important).
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on September 26, 2008, 05:37:07 AM
Hagen,

I don't know the parentage, but as far as I am concerned, both 'Poseidon' (aka 'Jaroslavna') and 'Neptun' were bred in Latvia. Anyway, they obviously differ from many almost similar looking pinkish purple cultivars.

Mark, I know that 'Larisa Dolina' is tall. I planted mine right during blooming, as I got it late in the season.

Relating colchicum pseciosum forms;
in literature (at least in the ones I had a look at) album, , giganteum, rubrum, Atrorubens, turkicum and veratrifolium are listed as forms or variations and treated as species. Anyway, I don' know any sourse or grower who cultivates the form rubrum.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on September 26, 2008, 05:46:44 AM
By the way, Hagen,

I strongly recommend you to grow colchicum 'Pink Goblet'. If you like colchicum speciosum Album, you will certainly like this one too. It has the same perfect shape of speciosum, just with pink flowers.
Here is the photo
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 26, 2008, 06:37:53 AM
Hi Zhirair, I also mean, the best form of all colchicums has C s ALBUM. Elegant and globular. Hope PINK GOBLET will enjoy/delight me some days later.
My first POSEIDON came from Prague under the name C purpureum, never heard before and after. So Poseidon must be an old cultivar (bought it in 1982).
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on September 26, 2008, 09:45:44 AM
The painted lady butterfly (Cynthia cardui) gives some idea of how big these flowers really are! :o
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: mark smyth on September 26, 2008, 01:47:56 PM
I grow too many of my larger Colchicums in pots and cant wait for a new bed to be built in the back garden when they will be grown. The Colchicums will be in a lower bed around the larger bed so their large leaves dont get in the way during the summer
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on September 26, 2008, 04:30:13 PM
I grow too many of my larger Colchicums in pots and cant wait for a new bed to be built in the back garden when they will be grown. /quote]

Mark

What is stopping you - Summer has just arrived.  ;D
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on September 26, 2008, 05:51:48 PM
I grow mine in pots because they are decimated by slugs in the garden.

 C. speciosum album is wonderful.

here is 'waterlily' in the sunshine.I do not like it but my wife does so it stays.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: mark smyth on September 26, 2008, 06:03:20 PM
I have never seen 'Waterlily' looking so good.

The weather has been so good this week. Today was a fraction below 20C
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 26, 2008, 06:18:24 PM
WATERLILY isn`t bad and a woman`s wish is holy.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 26, 2008, 06:30:17 PM


I don't know the parentage, but as far as I am concerned, both 'Poseidon' (aka 'Jaroslavna') and 'Neptun' were bred in Latvia. Anyway, they obviously differ from many almost similar looking pinkish purple cultivars.


Zhirair, do you mean POSEIDON and JAROSLAVNA are the same plants???
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: TC on September 26, 2008, 08:50:37 PM
Can anyone confirm the i.d. of this colchicum ? I took the picture in Lesvos in October 1996 and believe it to be Colchicum autumnale but I had not put the name on the slide mount.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: mark smyth on September 26, 2008, 08:59:05 PM
Here's my 'Jaroslavna'/'Poseiden' taken today in the sunshine. And from last year's East Anglia AGS bulb sale C. sfikasianum
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on September 27, 2008, 05:36:44 AM
Hagen,
yes, 'Jaroslavna' and 'Poseidon' are the same plants and 'Jaroslavna' is a priority name for this variety.

Tony
as a lover of classic shapes with globular strogly goblet-shaped and wide-petalled forms, I also don't like 'Waterlily' and grow it just for the interest and different appearance. It has a buxsom look, but indeed, can't be considered as beautiful.

Relating the pot culture of large-flowered colchicums;
I notice that colchicums, especially autumn-blooming ones, don't like dry air inside, they finish vegetation much earlier and large bulbs form smaller replacement bulbs. In my ipinion, pots should be at least placed in the open air during vegetation in spring.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: tonyg on September 27, 2008, 12:22:29 PM
Can anyone confirm the i.d. of this colchicum ? I took the picture in Lesvos in October 1996 and believe it to be Colchicum autumnale but I had not put the name on the slide mount.
Tom.  At first glance I wondered about C bivonae, but I am at work and do not have reference books to consult re distribution.  I don't think it is C autumnale as this is not ususally so strongly chequered.  Others will hopefully expound!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on September 27, 2008, 02:45:24 PM
Recently given this small Colchicum.  I believe it is a ssp. of cupanni.

Colchicum coustourierii
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Armin on September 27, 2008, 10:19:38 PM
Super Colchicums from everybody.

I'm just beginning putting an eye on Colchicums.

C.autumnale album and C. cilcicum laid beginning of September and now in flower.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Lesley Cox on September 27, 2008, 11:05:25 PM
and a woman`s wish is holy.

Of course! :)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 28, 2008, 08:01:50 AM
Last novemberlight and Colchicum autumnale  PLENUM. The flowers of this colchicum are  the latest in my garden.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on September 28, 2008, 03:33:23 PM
Another C.bivonae this time from Mt Olympus
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Lvandelft on September 28, 2008, 06:57:48 PM
Last novemberlight  and Colchicum autumnale  PLENUM. The flowers of this colchicum are  the latest in my garden.
Do you believe "Snowdroptime" is coming faster that way, Hagen?  ??? ;D ;D ;D
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: tonyg on September 28, 2008, 11:53:08 PM
At the start of September Colchicum variegatum erupted with far more flowers than in previous years.
More recently Colchicum montanum has delighted.  I grow both an 'old' form long in cultivation and some that I raised from seed I collected in the Pyrenees about 10 years ago.  The latter are a little darker.
Finally Colchicum boissieri a really nice dark form with good sized flowers for such a small species.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on September 29, 2008, 05:21:53 AM
Wonderful photos, Tony!

beautiful colchicums, especially colchicum boissieri - highly impressive!
Interesting - I like colchicums very much, but donn't like merenderas at all, though your merendera montana looks pretty good.
Colchicum variegatum is one of the most interesting, but I don't succeed with it. I gorw it for several years, but it doesn't want to bloom. I think the reason is semi-shade - bulbs don't get enough warmth in summer to produce blooms.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 29, 2008, 06:37:41 AM
Morning all,
Hello Luit, there was a small talk about WATERLILY, so I posted the other PLENUM. C aut PLENUM is here real the last. I don`t want to miss it. Snowdroptime is already in my pots. ;D
Hi Tony, beautiful flowers, if I had a tunnel...???

Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: tonyg on September 29, 2008, 08:40:41 AM
Wonderful photos, Tony!  beautiful colchicums, especially colchicum boissieri - highly impressive!
Interesting - I like colchicums very much, but donn't like merenderas at all, though your merendera montana looks pretty good.  Colchicum variegatum is one of the most interesting, but I don't succeed with it. I gorw it for several years, but it doesn't want to bloom. I think the reason is semi-shade - bulbs don't get enough warmth in summer to produce blooms.
Glad you like them - the C boissieri is one of my favourites, I have grown it outside in a sandy raised bed but I think it is best with some protection from extreme cold.  Colchicum variegatum is in the same greenhouse raised bed as my Cyclamen graecum, I think the full sun and extra heat in summer helps with flowering.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 29, 2008, 10:03:24 PM
If gardening teaches us nothing else, it teaches us patience!

The colchicum in the attached photos came to me four years ago as 'Glory of Heemstede'. It is blooming this year for the first time. I have no idea why it took so long for it to bloom: the corm I received was a big, blooming size corm.

This is not what I expect 'Glory of Heemstede' to look like.

Would anyone like to hazard a guess about its identity? There is little evidence of tessellation. Several things about this cultivar stand out: it is very tall, the blooms rise straight out of the ground to about ten inches. And it seems to be keeping its tulip shape instead of opening wide (which virtually all colchicums in our climate do).  Also, the outer tepals are very wide, an inch and a quarter in the blossom shown.

Whatever it is, it's handsome and easy to like.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim McKenney on September 29, 2008, 10:05:34 PM
Oops! The second image didn't make it the first time.

Here it is.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: olegKon on September 30, 2008, 08:21:30 AM
Jim,
I received my C. "Glory of Hemsted" 4 or 5 years ago as a bulb and as yours it is flowering for the first time this year. I posted a pic in this thread #186 at the very beginning of its flowering, so the colour is darker now.
Some more Colchicums flowering:
Colchicum Glory of Hemsted
Colchicum giganteum
Colchicum Beaconsfield
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on September 30, 2008, 10:31:17 AM
Oleg,

are you sure of your colchicum 'Beaconsfield' being true to name?
This variety has a different shape of flower, base and the flowers are tessalated. Yours look something different.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: olegKon on September 30, 2008, 12:55:34 PM
One can never be sure, Zhirair. They were received with this name. Thank yuo for drawing my attention to this misidentification. If anyone has ideas of what they really are, I'll be much obliged
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 30, 2008, 01:15:09 PM
Hi Oleg, I also mean what Zhirair says: Your BEACONFIELD isn`t it. It looks more like VIOLET QUEEN. But here both are over. Hope I can post  pictures in the evening.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on September 30, 2008, 01:51:48 PM
Oleg,

I noticed that your colchicum 'Beaconsfield' has somewhat darker tubes. In my collection colchicum 'Lilac Wonder' also develops such tubes. You can have a look at it on page 14. Maybe you can find something common.

Hagen
I think 'Violate Queen' has darker flowers and somewhat different base. Anyway, it is quite difficult to identify colchicum cultivars among so many pinkish-purple varieties, which look almost similar with only slight differences.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 30, 2008, 03:51:36 PM
Yes Zhirair, it`s so like you says. I also meant LILAC WONDER. VIOLET QUEEN is too starry and the ends of the segments are more pointed, they are not light round.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on September 30, 2008, 07:48:04 PM
Good evening Oleg, Zhirair! hHere is a pic of some closed flowers of LILAC WONDER. (VIOLET QUEEN was a mistake of mine). I think it is the cultivar Oleg showed us. We can try a swap all together next year. But this cultivar in no rarity.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: olegKon on October 01, 2008, 03:12:31 PM
Zhirair and Hagen, thank you so much. It really looks Lilac wonder. I expect som more colchicums to flower later. Some of them can be misnamed. I'll be grateful for any corrections of their names.
Hagen,
is your C.autumnale Plenum flowering already? Here it doesn't appear untill late october and often is covered with snow blooming. If winter is early it tries to flower under snow and what I have is just poorly looking flowers after the snow melts in spring.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on October 01, 2008, 04:18:27 PM
Yes Oleg, C autumnale PLENUM is blooming now.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Rafa on October 01, 2008, 08:23:46 PM
Helllo friends,

Here, 3 new plants in the garden thanks to my friend Kurt Vickery
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on October 02, 2008, 07:30:29 PM
Was idly looking at some pots of snowdrop seedlings today when a pink flower in a moss-covered pot at the back of the area occupied by my seed pots caught my eye. I checked the label and found it to be Colchicum corsicum. This is a flower from my own seed sown a few years ago. This pot receives virtually no sun for most of the year, and not because it is Dunblane, but because it is behind a fence (so Vivienne can't see the pots from the kitchen window :() Ian Young is right. Sow seeds and what suits your regime will flourish. Needless to say, the parent plants, and another batch of seedlings, are in the bulb house.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Lars S on October 02, 2008, 08:15:45 PM
Hi Rafa,

very nice colchicums.  :)
Kind of more delicate than the autumnalis type I think. In which part of the world do they grow originally ?

All the best

Lars
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Rafa on October 02, 2008, 08:29:00 PM
Hello Lars,

I don't know very well the distribution, but for example you can find C. cupani in Tunisia
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Lesley Cox on October 05, 2008, 04:07:54 AM
A year ago, or maybe two, I was bemoaning the fact that after I still had no germination from Colchicum variegatum, sown in Dec 2002! Well, now I have. I was cleaning up and weeding pots of old seed that I still hoped might produce something, and there was a single seedling of the colchicum, almost 6 years after flowering. With better care and regular watering, maybe I'll get a few more soon. Several other things were present also, Lilium grayii after 4 years and some juno irises after 5.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: hadacekf on October 05, 2008, 07:28:54 PM
Colchicum cupani in my meadow - grow well.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on October 06, 2008, 05:07:18 AM
colchicum speciosum
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on October 06, 2008, 05:09:10 AM
colchicum 'Beaconsfield'
colchicum ‘Waterlily’
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: derekb on October 06, 2008, 06:56:43 PM
This is the first time I have flowered this one,not sure the name is correct as it is the wrong colour and blooming the wrong time any ideas.
  Colchicum szowitsii Vardahovit.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on October 06, 2008, 07:02:14 PM
Zhirair, do you have some words for the difference between C speciosum and C giganteum. Or some pics too?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: BULBISSIME on October 06, 2008, 08:31:34 PM
Just flowering in France, Colchicum filifolium (Merendera filifolia)

(http://i44.servimg.com/u/f44/11/84/35/03/img_7212.jpg) (http://www.servimg.com/image_preview.php?i=297&u=11843503)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: I.S. on October 07, 2008, 04:02:02 AM
derek,
Your nice colchicum looks me as a C. baytopiorum which bloom in autumn.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on October 07, 2008, 05:29:40 AM
Zhirair, do you have some words for the difference between C speciosum and C giganteum. Or some pics too?

Hagen, it is very easy to distinguish both, especially when they are grown together in one collection
.
colchicum speciosum has somewhat elongated flowers, without any tessaltion, colour is slightly darker, stronger tubes, orange anthers.

colchicum giganteum is rather tall, has rounded shape of flower,  bit paler in colour with slight tessalation, but the most important is colour of anthers-they are brownish (while colchicum speciosum has oringe anthers).

I posted colchicum giganteum photos in my prevous posts in this thread. I even remember that you commented my pics.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Olga Bondareva on October 07, 2008, 08:24:44 AM
Hello everyone! (http://forum.cofe.ru/images/smilies/hi.gif)

Please help Colchicum beginner. :) I’ve got recently some Colchicums and I am in doubt with their ID.

Colchicum speciosum
(http://cs1529.vkontakte.ru/u6450879/45874243/x_e5e88051.jpg)
I think it is not true species but a variety with darker flowers.

Another Colchicum speciosum
(http://cs1529.vkontakte.ru/u6450879/45874243/x_400aa2b3.jpg)

Colchicum tenorii
(http://cs1529.vkontakte.ru/u6450879/45874243/x_29eed92c.jpg)

Colchicum x hybr. - noname
(http://cs1529.vkontakte.ru/u6450879/45874243/x_10e4a7e1.jpg)

Colchicum autumnale
http://cs1436.vkontakte.ru/u6450879/45874243/x_67c4daa6.jpg
Think it's true.

And the last one I found in garden centre between ordinary C. speciosum.
(http://cs1529.vkontakte.ru/u6450879/45874243/x_7a3e161e.jpg)

(http://cs1529.vkontakte.ru/u6450879/45874243/x_6d68ffe7.jpg)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on October 07, 2008, 11:50:44 AM
Dear Olga,

The colchicum in your first picture should be colchicum speciosum Atrorubens, as it has flowers darker than those of the ordinary colchicum speciosum, and darker tubes. Besides, Atrorubens flowers rather late in the season.

The colchicum in your second picture looks like colchicum speciosum, but differs from mine by its flower shape. Your variety more reminds Turkish form Ordu.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: olegKon on October 08, 2008, 04:05:37 PM
Some more colchicums blooming now
1. Colchicum speciosum album
2. Colchicum autumnale album plenum
3. Colchicum sibsorpii
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on October 08, 2008, 07:21:34 PM
Hi Zhirair, yes I had to look again for C. giganteum. Now we have here in Germany a new cultivar of G. giganteum, called OKTOBERFEST. It looks very equal to ROSY DAWN but it blooms weeks later. Hope I can show some pics later.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: mark smyth on October 08, 2008, 08:09:03 PM
Here's 'Jarka. I dont think anyone has shown it this year. Despite having a large tuber the flowers are quite small
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Folypeelarks on October 08, 2008, 11:22:15 PM
What a lovely Colchicums...!

I would like to ask You something..  :-[

Before few days I was seized with itch to look around for some Colchicums and eventually to take some from the glades near the forest (I'm from Bulgaria..)..So, I went there and I found very large and stable population of Colchicum autumnale... They were almost fully faded because their blooming season was ending...I dig out few bulbs and took them with me and after that I put them in may garden...

So, what Do You think..I don't know how these flowers can be found during the spring..when They are in rest.In the summer They forms leaves..Does They have any chance in my home in this period...?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Thomas Huber on October 09, 2008, 08:20:05 AM
Nicolay, the best time to replant Colchicums is generally in their dormancy in summer, but I had no problems with
the plants I dug up when flowering. They have settled well in their new location each time!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Boyed on October 09, 2008, 11:36:03 AM
Folypeelarks,

Don't worry about the replanted colchicums. Everything will be O.K. As Thomas said, the best time to replant them is summer, but they easily survive also autumn replanting, though the replacement bulbs during harvesting can be a little bit smaller. In spring they form big leaves and you will easily notice them.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Folypeelarks on October 09, 2008, 08:51:03 PM
Oh, I am sorry, when I wanted to say spring (about the period when the leaves are formed) , I said summer \It's because of my english..I make silly mistakes sometimes..\.

Thanks for the help, guys!Actually, I thought to mark somehow the places where are the plants in the spring and in the summer to dig out the bulbs.But..I was not sure that the markings would be still visible..

However, I am considering to fertilize the plants in the spring when They forms their leaves..I think that it's the way to recover them from the autumn replanting.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hagen Engelmann on October 10, 2008, 06:41:17 AM
Here is OKTOBERFEST. It`s an C. giganteum seedling. Came from Bernhard Röllich, Germany. Looks like a late flowering ROSY DAWN. Color is much better then the pic.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: ian mcenery on October 11, 2008, 12:24:18 AM
Here are a few small plants in flower at present.

Colchicum baytopiorum
 Colchicum variegatum
 Colchicum cupanii



Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Olga Bondareva on October 11, 2008, 05:57:06 AM
Zhirair, thanks!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hans A. on October 12, 2008, 05:41:14 PM
Has anyone an Idea which Colchicum could be this one? It has large leaves and resembles C. macrophyllum - but if it is? Searching in this thread and in internet I could not find any which fitted 100%...
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Luc Gilgemyn on October 13, 2008, 10:40:14 AM
Here are a few small plants in flower at present.





Small but beautiful Ian !!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: BULBISSIME on October 13, 2008, 11:15:18 AM
Has anyone an Idea which Colchicum could be this one? It has large leaves and resembles C. macrophyllum - but if it is? Searching in this thread and in internet I could not find any which fitted 100%...


Hi Hans,
here is a picture of my C. macrophyllum, looks like yours !
Except color of pollen...

(http://i44.servimg.com/u/f44/11/84/35/03/img_7010.jpg) (http://www.servimg.com/image_preview.php?i=315&u=11843503)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Thomas Huber on October 13, 2008, 03:46:46 PM
Great plant, Hans and Fred!

Here some more from Neustadt, taken in my "small-colchicum-corner"
Colchicum psaridis has the strongest scent I've ever noticed on any Colchicum.
On a warm and sunny day the air smells like filled with honey.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Luc Gilgemyn on October 13, 2008, 03:52:41 PM
A very nice clump Thomas !!!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Oron Peri on October 14, 2008, 10:05:36 AM
Opened this morning, the first  C. feinbruniae.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Oron Peri on October 14, 2008, 10:13:45 AM
I'm adding a photo of this species in its natural habitat in the Golan Heights
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on October 14, 2008, 12:43:54 PM
Oron

What a beautiful Colchicum with excellent tessalation.  Not one I have seen before.

Nice to see in natural surroundings
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on October 14, 2008, 03:46:04 PM
Oron that is beautiful in the wild.I have only seen the larger autumn flowering plants as singles although sometimes many bulbs in flower.

Now a question in general. There are lots of great pictures of colchicum species all with different names but many looking exactly the same. For instance what I would call C. bivonae appear in numerous disguises.  I understand that there has been a great splitting up of the Turkish ones and I wonder if there has been an account published?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Oron Peri on October 14, 2008, 04:57:35 PM
Now a question in general. There are lots of great pictures of colchicum species all with different names but many looking exactly the same. For instance what I would call C. bivonae appear in numerous disguises.  I understand that there has been a great splitting up of the Turkish ones and I wonder if there has been an account published?
[/quote]

Thanks Art and Tony.

Infact Tony, Colchicum  is one of the most difficult Genus to classify [maybe only Gagea is more difficult] , as far as I know there isn't any account published, at least not for the East Mediterranean species.

Infact many of the large flowered Colchicums [in particular the tessellated ones] have 1-3 flowers for a mature bulb. In the case of C. feinbruniae a mature bulb can carry many more, which is one if the differences that separate it  from other close relatives, but it might be also  a subsp of C. bivonae which is growing up north in turkey.

The problem is that there isn't a lot of information available regarding bulbous plants in Lebanon and Syria and there for it is hard to draw a map of the distribution of certain species, a data that would make the work of  classification easier.
 From what I have heard lately it is again the form and size of the bulb that decisive classification.

In some species, as  in the case of C. stevenii variation in flower form, size and color is so big that even 2 plants in the same colony seems two be different species, but if you look at the bulbs you understand immediately that they belong to the same species.

 


Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Oron Peri on October 14, 2008, 05:08:00 PM
Another problem with Colchicum is that many of the plants in commerce are hybrids and there for it is impossible to classify them, as in the case of C. agrippinum [ i think it should be X agrrippinum]which origins are not clear.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on October 14, 2008, 09:57:22 PM
Oron thanks for those comments.I was really referring to the Turkish ones which seem to have numerous names.

 I do find that well grown plants here produce several flowers per bulb but in the wild I have only seen one. It maybe that they are produced in succession in the wild whilst in cultivation it is possible to get several at once.

I do not plant my collection out in the garden because I think they become mixed up and in the pots I know where they all come from. Another reason is that the flowers are totally eaten by slugs in the garden
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Paul T on October 14, 2008, 10:39:44 PM
Oron,

The C. feinbruniae is an excellent flower.  Great form and tesselation. Beautiful.

Tony,

I had a single Colchicum bulb (I'd have to look up which species.... I'm at work at the moment) which produced 22 flowers the year I bought it.  :o  The bulb was the size of a good sized apple.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Lesley Cox on October 15, 2008, 08:44:07 PM

Colchicum psaridis has the strongest scent I've ever noticed on any Colchicum.
On a warm and sunny day the air smells like filled with honey.

How very sticky! :D
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Hans A. on October 16, 2008, 06:41:25 PM
Has anyone an Idea which Colchicum could be this one? It has large leaves and resembles C. macrophyllum - but if it is? Searching in this thread and in internet I could not find any which fitted 100%...


Hi Hans,
here is a picture of my C. macrophyllum, looks like yours !
Except color of pollen...

(http://i44.servimg.com/u/f44/11/84/35/03/img_7010.jpg) (http://www.servimg.com/image_preview.php?i=315&u=11843503)

Thanks Fred, i think the polen colour is typical for C. macrophyllum - it should not be yellow... mine will be an hybrid...
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Jim on October 17, 2008, 03:58:43 PM
Hi All,
Tony Willis asked if there was an account of the Turkish Colchicums. Karin Persson has written many great articles on Colchicums. I think she is responsible for a lot of the newly named species. I have copies of many of her papers and would be happy to make copies if anyone is interested. Just email me.
Jim
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: mark smyth on October 17, 2008, 04:18:54 PM
Opened this morning, the first  C. feinbruniae.

Hello Oron

I would be interested in swapping with you in the summer for this Colchicum if you have any to spare

Mark
N Ireland
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on October 19, 2008, 01:10:33 AM
Still confused about these wee colchicums. The first is probably correct and is pusillum. The second was sent as cupanii but clearly isn't. Brown anthers suggest cretense, but it could be another pusillum?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Michael J Campbell on October 19, 2008, 12:52:43 PM
Oron, I will be in Galilee in about four weeks, will there be anything still in bloom by then.

Cheers

Michael.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Oron Peri on October 19, 2008, 01:15:29 PM
Oron, I will be in Galilee in about four weeks, will there be anything still in bloom by then.

Cheers

Michael.

Michael, I'm sure there will be many things to see in 4 weeks time [depends on rain], mainly on Mt. Hermon, Golan Heights and the Galilee.

I can take you to see some nice places, contact me privately so we can arrange it.
oron
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: olegKon on October 19, 2008, 08:51:23 PM
 I received this tiny colchicum (not more than 4 cm high)  as Colchicum atropurpureum. Can anyone confirm the name? (Sorry, the wheather is awful)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Lesley Cox on October 19, 2008, 09:19:42 PM
What a little pet that one is Oleg! :)

Michael, you've given us all something special to look forward to. Your camera will be on overtime wages.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: tonyg on October 19, 2008, 09:48:56 PM
I received this tiny colchicum (not more than 4 cm high)  as Colchicum atropurpureum. Can anyone confirm the name?
I saw something very similar with that name at Edinburgh botanics a couple of years ago.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: dominique on October 21, 2008, 11:10:38 PM
Hi  Oleg
Colchicum autumnale var. atropurpureum look like that you show us. It is a very late flowering form of autumnale, very short and one of the darkest Colchicum. It seems true
Dom
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: olegKon on October 22, 2008, 03:53:08 PM
Thanks everybody for the confirmation. It's really late flowering ( and rather shy) but not the latest here. I expect to see C. autumnale Plenum in a day or 2, which will be the last. Thanks again.
Oleg
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Oron Peri on October 23, 2008, 06:56:45 PM
Starts to bloom on Mt. Hermon C. antilibanoticum [syn. C. tauri],
One of the small size Colchicums but still very showy, this 'spider' like form  is quite common.

I have tried to grow it here with me but  seems it needs a long period of cold weather.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Paul T on October 24, 2008, 11:59:33 AM
Love that spidery form, and the dark anthers set it off even more.  Wow!  :o
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on October 24, 2008, 12:59:24 PM
Oron, you are taking us into new and exciting realms with this topic. :) Keep them coming, and please look out for the seeds. ;)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Oron Peri on October 24, 2008, 03:12:52 PM
Thanks Anthony,
Its a pleasure to share these things with other people with same intrests.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on October 24, 2008, 03:44:06 PM
Oron

Wonderful Colchicum - I Googled to find out how tall it is and all they say is TINY.  All pictures show a flower that is quite 'pink' whereas your examples look almost white.  Is this a typical plant on Mount Hermon?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Oron Peri on October 24, 2008, 04:02:20 PM
Arthur,

I would say 3-5 cm with its neck, it grows mainly on Mt Hermon and other mountains of S. Lebanon
I assume it grows also in parts of  W. Syria.
As in the case of some other colchicum species  in the area there is a large variation in color, from pure white to some really dark pinks.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Oron Peri on October 24, 2008, 04:19:43 PM
There is one which is really tiny 2-4cm, C. tunicatum that is now almost ending its bloom.
It is quite common in the Negev & Judea deserts as well as in Jordan.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Ian Y on October 24, 2008, 08:09:45 PM
Wonderful pictures Oron of many bulbs I have not seen.

Am I miss reading the picture or has C. antilibanoticum  got green anthers?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Oron Peri on October 24, 2008, 08:49:26 PM
Am I miss reading the picture or has C. antilibanoticum  got green anthers?

Yes the anthers are more Grayish green in color, this phenomenon exists in two closely related species in this region.
C. antilibanoticum and the rare C. tuviae from the Negev desert [ another tiny species that blooms from late November to January]
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Maggi Young on October 24, 2008, 09:04:37 PM
Quote
and the rare C. tuviae from the Negev desert [ another tiny species that blooms from late November to January]

Oh! My word, wait till Ian sees this little gem...... fantastic colchicums, Oron!  8)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: annew on October 26, 2008, 09:42:11 AM
Those tiny ones are terrific.
I grew this from seed at C. boissieri, I'd be grateful for confirmation of the name, please. Thanks.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on October 26, 2008, 08:08:11 PM
Here's another pic of pusillum now the leaves are well up. Much broader than my others.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Paddy Tobin on October 26, 2008, 08:22:50 PM
Oron,

It is absolutely wonderful to view these photographs of plants we could not otherwise ever see - well, I don't see myself travelling to the deserts of Judea in the near future at any rate.

Delighted to see the photographs, many thanks.


Paddy
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: tonyg on October 26, 2008, 09:59:40 PM
Those tiny ones are terrific.
I grew this from seed at C. boissieri, I'd be grateful for confirmation of the name, please. Thanks.
Anne - It looks about right but its difficult to be sure from the flower alone. The two forms of C boissieri that I have grown both have very distinctive bulbs.  (Is that the right term for a Colchicum - bulb??)  The bulbs are very thin and elongated, almost like pieces of couch grass when small.  The larger ones may have two 'fingers' each with a growing shoot at the tip.  I have not grown any other colchicum with bulbs like this and would consider it a distinctive feature .... until someone tells me of others with the same type of bulb.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Luc Gilgemyn on October 27, 2008, 09:18:53 AM
Thanks for showing us these little gems from these for us inaccessible areas Oron !! Stunning plants - never seen before  :o
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: dominique on October 27, 2008, 09:30:10 AM
Gorgeous plants Oron, thank you. Our dreams go now with their seeds....!!!!
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on October 27, 2008, 10:08:05 AM
Tony

Agree with every word on Colchicum boisierri. 

Beautiful flower, but sometimes shy to flower.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: udo on October 27, 2008, 05:20:43 PM
Hello Colchicum-Friends,
who can me help?
I become this species from a friend, coll. in NE Greece, near Thessaloniki
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: hadacekf on October 27, 2008, 07:09:48 PM

Dirk,
Looks like C. bivonae  to me.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Oron Peri on October 27, 2008, 08:14:17 PM
Here are some more Colchicum in bloom now, all four species have Eastern Mediterranean distribution.
C. Troodi
C. hierosolymitanum
The beautiful C. brachyphyllum
and the most variable in color and forms C. stevenii
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: tonyg on October 27, 2008, 11:13:12 PM
Fabulous again Oron.  Thanks so much for joining our Forum and sharing your plant pictures and knowledge.  By coincidence I was sowing seed today .... including Colchicum brachyphyllum.  Thanks again ;)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: udo on October 28, 2008, 05:40:02 PM
Hello Franz,
many thanks for this information.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: dominique on October 28, 2008, 06:05:28 PM
Dirk,
I think too bivonae. Oron, fabulous pics
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on October 31, 2008, 08:25:57 PM
Hello Colchicum-Friends,
who can me help?
I become this species from a friend, coll. in NE Greece, near Thessaloniki

Dirk

I have this same species from the foothills of Mt Olympus which is just a few kms from where yours come from and I also think it is bivonae
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: annew on October 31, 2008, 09:33:38 PM
Thanks, Tony. I'll have a look when repotting, but I don't remember it looking unusual.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: I.S. on November 02, 2008, 07:29:19 AM
And this one is my C. bivonae from nort-west corner for Turkey near Buldaria and Greece frontier. That was realy an huge Colchicum which I have not seen before. But it was not best of its showy face. There were only two sample in the area. :(
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on November 02, 2008, 03:58:32 PM
Ibrahim very nice I think it is bivonae the same as the one shown by Dirk.

Here is one I am calling C.variegatum from SW Turkey
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: olegKon on November 04, 2008, 02:18:28 PM
Last colchicums for this season taken in the garden yesterday. The first is Colchicum autumnale Flore Pleno. I have no idea about the name of the second one. Rather small and late. An alien bulb must have been supplied with a clump of an allium in the middle of which it has been happily flowering for many years. Nice bonus, isn't it? Any suggestions of what it may be?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Paul T on November 05, 2008, 05:08:13 AM
Is that last one a Merendera?  Looks like the petals are split, rather than fused into a tube?  Could just be the angle though.  Nice looking plant, whatever it is.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: olegKon on November 05, 2008, 11:46:39 AM
Paul, thanks for interest. I'm afraid it's not a Merendera as the petals are fused into a tube. Another picture will possibly show that.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on November 05, 2008, 02:29:55 PM
Is anything a Merendera now? ???
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Maggi Young on November 05, 2008, 03:23:45 PM
Is anything a Merendera now? ???

Ummmmmm? No, I don't think so! :-\
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on November 05, 2008, 03:32:03 PM
Is anything a Merendera now? ???

Ummmmmm? No, I don't think so! :-\

they are if you want them to be,I shall not be changing mine
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: I.S. on November 06, 2008, 09:05:59 AM
Tony,
Thank you for your confirmation my colchicum. Yours is the best one but I think that pot is small for a C. vareagatum. isn't it?
Here is another of mines. This came to me as a trophy from north east of Turkey.
And the last two  are my native colchicum from Istanbul.


 C. speciosum
 C. speciosum...
 Colchicum micranthum Kemerburgaz
 C.  cilicicum (byzantinum)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on November 06, 2008, 09:53:25 AM
Ibrahim

they are very nice,the speciosus is a perfect shape. I collected three in 1988 on the Zigana and they have done well in the garden and I now have dozens.Only problem in the garden is slugs ruin the flowers

I grow my bulbs in as small pots as possible to save room. They seem to grow okay and they also root through the hole in the bottom into the sand plunge and get some extra nourishment there.

Did you get to see Crocus nerimainae ?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on November 06, 2008, 02:17:37 PM
Is anything a Merendera now? ???
Ummmmmm? No, I don't think so! :-\

they are if you want them to be,I shall not be changing mine

You tell 'em Tony. 8) They are sufficiently distinct to be split into two genera. :)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Paul T on November 06, 2008, 09:10:16 PM
Oleg,

Thanks.  From the first pic I thought they were separate petals.  Yes, I know there aren't Merendera any more, but it was to get the point across.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: I.S. on November 07, 2008, 04:52:06 AM
Tony,
Unfortunately I couldn't get free time yet. I am still very busy in work
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: I.S. on November 07, 2008, 01:20:44 PM
Here are some pics which I would like to share with you from last week. The pics taken in NGBB (a garden specialy for bulbs) from Istanbul. I visit some times this garden. The plant seems quite happy there.

Colchicum baytopiorum NGBB 011
 Colchicum baytopiorum NGBB 013
 Colchicum lingulatum
 Colchicum lycium
 Colchicum persicum NGBB 2
 Colchicum persicum NGBB 004
 Colchicum pusillum
 Colchicum sanguicolle
 Colchicum sp.!




Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: ashley on November 07, 2008, 04:41:38 PM
What a lovely series Ibrahim; thank you.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Oron Peri on November 07, 2008, 05:15:48 PM
Here are some pics which I would like to share with you from last week. The pics taken in NGBB (a garden specialy for bulbs) from Istanbul. I visit some times this garden. The plant seems quite happy there

Ibrahim,

Great photos and lovely species...
Can you please give more details about this garden in Istanbul?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: tonyg on November 07, 2008, 09:16:24 PM
Ibrahim, thank you for sharing your impressions of the NGBB.  Even if we were able to visit (perhaps one day I will come) your regular visits help us to always see the best things.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: I.S. on November 08, 2008, 05:02:01 AM
Oron, Here is the page of NGBB garden. They have some informations in english also.
 http://www.ngbb.gen.tr/index.php?icerik_id=7
They say that they have more then 300 specieses in 2000 pots. They all collected from wild. They have a quite large bulb collection.
Tony, If you have any chance one day to see Istanbul. You should see that garden.

Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Oron Peri on November 08, 2008, 07:10:25 AM
Ibrahim,

Thank you for the information,
Certainly worth a visit!!!!

oron
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: mark smyth on November 08, 2008, 09:43:46 AM
Colchicum lycium is a beauty
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Brian Ellis on November 08, 2008, 10:22:40 AM
http://www.stars21.com/translator/turkish_to_english.html

Is helpful for translating the site. 8)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Tony Willis on November 08, 2008, 10:50:06 AM
Ibrahim

very nice colchicum photographs from the NGBB garden.I would think they would grow very well in that area.

I see the garden is quite near Uskudar which Brian Mathew gave as a good area for Iris suaveolens but which I now think is hundreds of blocks of flats. I found Crocus pestalozzae growing along the road not far from there on the way to Iznik.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on November 10, 2008, 09:29:23 AM
Ibrahim, that form of pusillum is fantastic. I have never seen one so rich in colour. 8)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: tonyg on November 10, 2008, 02:25:57 PM
Its not something that I notice as reliably as the flowering time but I'd say don't expect any dramatic action until spring.  Noses may break the surface earlier but the main thrust of growth is when the spring weather begins to warm up.  The leaves often persist into summer until the weather really hots up.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on November 10, 2008, 02:36:09 PM
The leaves are a real pain. I bought Colchicum graecum from PC, thinking it was small leaved (he advertises it as suitable companion to Leucojum autumnale ::)), but like most others, it is a real thug with leaves dominating its section of rockery. :(
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Maggi Young on November 10, 2008, 02:48:21 PM
Rob, the leaves tend not to come up in the garden varieties until much later on... early spring. They can be large, which is why we plant them at the edge of borders or at the base of trees where the large leaves can grow, and in time, flop, without being a bother.

Since you grow most of your bulbs in pots ( I think I am  correct in saying?) then it will be quite simple for you to move the pots to a suitable place when the leaves get really big.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on November 10, 2008, 03:21:51 PM
A good idea Maggi. I don't have the space, so binned most of my garden varieties.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: mark smyth on November 10, 2008, 05:25:47 PM
I have many Colchicum leaves pushing up now. Some winter flowering Colchicums have noses above ground.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on November 13, 2008, 01:41:39 PM
Whilst on holiday in Greece recently, several Colchicum were found in flower.  The first was Colchicum boissieri - found around Mount Parnassos
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on November 13, 2008, 03:38:21 PM
Just outside Delphi, on a piece of scrubland, we saw our first Colchicum cupanii
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on November 14, 2008, 10:02:50 AM
That looks more like pusillum?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: art600 on November 14, 2008, 10:15:54 AM
Anthony

I have not seen pusillum before, and assumed cupanii.

Can someone please confirm the identification.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Anthony Darby on November 14, 2008, 11:18:46 AM
I think cupanii has a pair of large, wide (~1+ cm), leaves whereas pusillum has more, narrow (~0·5 cm) leaves.
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Gerdk on November 14, 2008, 05:44:11 PM
Here is Colchicum atticum (syn. Merendera attica) flowering much earlier and with larger flowers than in 2007.

Gerd
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Armin on November 14, 2008, 06:13:30 PM
Gerd,
a beautiful wee one!
I'm anxious to see it next week! ;)
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Lvandelft on November 14, 2008, 06:33:54 PM
Here is Colchicum atticum (syn. Merendera attica) flowering much earlier and with larger flowers than in 2007.

Gerd
Same treatment as your Narcissus Gerd?
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: mark smyth on November 14, 2008, 06:58:26 PM
Here are the leaves of Colchicum cupanii. Sadly this Colchicum like many other small species in my collection died this year while dormant
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Gerdk on November 14, 2008, 07:43:02 PM
Here is Colchicum atticum (syn. Merendera attica) flowering much earlier and with larger flowers than in 2007.
Gerd
Same treatment as your Narcissus Gerd?

Luit,
Not the VIP treatment as my autum flowering daffs had, only totally dry inside the greenhouse.

Gerd
Title: Re: Colchicums autumn 2008
Post by: Luc Gilgemyn on November 15, 2008, 03:37:23 PM
Very nice one Gerd !!!
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